A carnival for booklovers

Finding her way amid an excited crowd at the entrance of Ekushey Boi Mela in the port city's CRB area, Shanta Devnath managed to enter a stall.

Browsing through the titles, the Chittagong University student finally picked up a book and started turning its pages.

"I have loved the smell of new books since I was a child," said Shanta.

The Amar Ekushey Boi Mela at Shirishtola saw a great turnout of booklovers this Friday and yesterday. The sales were also satisfactory, said publishers.

Earlier, the fair used to be held at MA Aziz Stadium gymnasium. However, the new location is much better, said Anamika Dhar, a resident of city's Patharghata Bundle Road.

Ishrat Jahan, an eleventh grader, was seen looking at the Humayun Ahmed collections. "I am his fan and plan to purchase some of his titles I am yet to read," he said.

This correspondent spoke to many others at the fair, including schoolteacher Tapash Barua, an avid traveller looking for travel books at the stall of Prothoma Prokashan; and ninth-grader Mosharraf, a fan of Muhammad Zafar Iqbal's novels.

Content with the sales, Md Junaid, a salesperson of Labonyo Prokashani, said, "We are expecting more visitors in the coming days."

A total of 92 publishing houses are participating in the fair which has a capacity of 155 stalls, mentioned Nisar Uddin Ahmed, a councillor of CCC and convener of the book fair.

The fair is open for all from 3:00pm to 9:00pm on weekdays and 10:00am to 9:00pm on weekends till March 2.