Ekushey book fair ends with big turnout
The month-long Amar Ekushey book fair, the country's biggest congregation of booklovers, authors, and publishers, ended yesterday with a massive turnout.
This year the fair, which offers city dwellers an oasis of solace amid the busy urban life, has witnessed the highest number of new books hitting the shelves in the last five years.
Many of the publishers seemed very happy with the sales on the last day of the fair while a few expressed dissatisfactions.
Member secretary of the fair organising committee Jalal Ahmed said the arrangement this time was better than the previous years.
While reading out the closing report, he said a total of 4,919 new titles hit the fair this year with 184 of them on the last day.
Like the previous years, books on poetry, novel and short story dominated the new arrival list.
According to Bangla Academy, the number of new titles was 4,834 in 2019, 4,591 in 2018, 3,646 in 2017 and 3,444 in 2016.
Jalal said according to organisers' estimates, the combined sale at this year's book fair was about Tk 82 crore, a rise from Tk 77.55 crore last year.
Several publishers expressed satisfaction over the overall management and environment of the fair.
"Book fair has now turned into a festival. For further improvement of the fair, the organising committee should pay more attention to well-established publishers in the future," said Osman Gani of Agamee Prakashani.
Shahadat Hossain of Annesha Prakashon and Aditya Antor of Ittadi Grantha Prokash said many "seasonal" publishers set up stalls at the fair to sell pirated books.
Celebrated Indian poem Rudra Goswami told The Daily Star that the love of Bangladeshi people for books, book fair and language was unparalleled.
"This book fair is a universal one. This provides me with an opportunity to meet the readers; and their praises and criticisms help me correct myself," he said.
This year, Kotha Prakash received the Chittaranjan Saha Memorial Award for publishing the highest number of quality books, while three publishing houses -- Prothoma Prokashan, Journeyman Books, Bengal Publications -- received the Munier Chowdhury Smriti Puraskar 2019 for their creative and quality publications.
Panjeri Publications received Rokanuzzaman Khan Dadabhai Smrity Purashkar-2019 for publishing quality books.
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