Calcutta Book Fair stats from today
Image by dchrisoh via Flickr
Book lovers can enjoy visiting a fortnight long book fair, which started here on Monday. Well-known Mexican writer Jorge Luis Volpi Escalante inaugurated the fair.
The fair, with 650 book stalls comprising books on various fields is being participated by 14 countries including Mongolia, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Romania.
Mexico has been made the theme nation in a bid to improve ties between the two countries.
“Mexican books are written in Spanish language. It is not possible for all of us to understand the Spanish language though we will have some idea about their literature, I thank the organizers and I hope that our fair will be fair of people and well be able to maintain the culture of the fair,” said West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee.
Organisers of the book fair witnessed a good response last year, and they anticipate it to be even better this time.
“Last year approximately 1.5 million visitors commuted the fair and total turnover of the participants was roughly rupees 1.7 crores, so it has been recognised by international publishers Association, Geneva, Switzerland as the largest attended book fair of the world,” said Tridib Chatterjee, secretary, publishers and book sellers guild.
The fair will remain open till February 07 (ANI)
