Why Fair is Foul in Kolkata

The acute lack-of-readiness was evident last year itself when the book fair was shifted to a new venue after a break of two years. There were too many stalls — 512 — and too little space for people,and the Kolkata Book Fair never wants of a crowd. Even this year — with 600 stalls — when the lights went on the blink,there were thousands inside the premises,and thousands outside waiting to get in. During the heyday of the book fair at its old venue,the Maidan,25 lakh people used to visit. But,sadly,the fair organisers don’t appear to have learnt the lessons and put off all preparations to the last possible minute,thus harassing book-sellers and lovers no end.

For Sidharth Pansari,owner of Crossword Bookstores in Kolkata,and who’s visiting the World Book Fair in Delhi,the contrast between the two fairs is telling. The Delhi fair,in its 19th year,is organised in great detail; the older Kolkata counterpart is falling apart.

The other damper to the annual Kolkata event is the fact that the World Book Fair in Delhi is being held concurrently. Admits Thomas Abraham,MD,Hachette India: “A full overlap is counterproductive.” Ask him why he chose to keep Hachette India away from the Kolkata fair and he explains: “The main reason why we stayed away from the Kolkata Book Fair is that we’re new and wanted to get our hand in at the World Book Fair in Delhi where we have staff to set up locally. The second reason is that we checked Kolkata out last year and found the dust in the stalls a real hazard to books.” Hachette India wants to be sure that infrastructurally it is all right to set up shop at the Kolkata Book Fair,and though it says it will be there next year,there’s little that the fair organisers have done in 2010 to convince booksellers. Points out Lipika Bhushan,marketing manager,HarperCollins India,which has opted out for the second consecutive year: “There are infrastructural issues in Kolkata about space/location.” But she adds that this year the World Book Fair beckoned the publisher. “All our energies were attuned to the Delhi fair. It’s unfair that the two fairs coincided.”

Booksellers and Publishers Guild general secretary Tridib Chatterjee brushes aside the complaints,saying the book fair is a “craze” in Kolkata and this year the turnout and sales will be better than last year. Last year,the guild made Rs 1.7 crore from direct sales — “that’s what we are hoping to earn from one stall at the Delhi fair,” says a publisher,who didn’t want to be named.

Over the last few years,things haven’t gone right for the fair. For instance,in 2008,when Kolkata officially launched the bid to become a Unesco city of literature,the book fair was banned for its choice of venue. For two years,environmentalists had been running a campaign against pollution at the Maidan,but when the ban came,there wasn’t a Plan B and writer Paul Theroux had already arrived in the city. America was the theme country in focus — this year it’s Mexico — and the writer was stunned by the lack of preparedness for the city’s arguably most important “international” event.

Though Abraham thinks the Kolkata fair has been “savaged beyond its due” and that the infrastructure problems are none that are not fixable,he says what it needs to do is to “rid itself of the whole insider benefit thing”. He points out that if you are a member of the Guild you get in at a fee about a third of what others who are not members have to pay. “A 10-15 per cent discount to members is understandable,even a discount for NGOs and non-commercial organisations,but the current fee structure is absolutely iniquitous and usurious. The fair would also benefit from some professional management and design help,” he says.

Till the book fair organisers get their act together,“crazy” Kolkatans will flock to the fair,and hopefully buy what’s on offer,from Mamata Banerjee’s Nandi-Ma (her account of the Nandigram struggle) to Shakespeare in 10 volumes.