THE Kolkata Book Fair 2014 drew to an end a few days ago. In the fourteen days of the fair, there were around twenty lac visitors to the fair ground. People from different walks of life and of different disciplines all thronged the Milan Mela, the fairground based in the eastern hub of the city, opposite Science city.

About Kolkata Book Fair 2014:
This year's Kolkata Book Fair was inaugurated on January 28, 2014 by the chief minister of the state, Ms Mamata Banerjee, and opened to the public from January 29, 2014, ending on February 9, 2014. This year there were around 500 stalls set up in different zones of the Milan Mela. The focal theme was on Peru, a prominent Latin American country to talk about. One prominent Nobel Laureate from Latin Literature, Jorge Mario Pedro Vargas Llosa, visited the fair ground. Apart from him, there were also visits by Indian authors and also by writers from neighbouring Bangladesh. Besides the Peru stall, the stalls of the US, British Council and Bangladesh were also present, thus giving immense joy to the vast numbers of book lovers of the city.

Involvement of visitors:
The visitors to the 38th Kolkata Book Fair seemed not to be so motivated about books. But exceptions were definitely there. What was mostly noticeable in this year's book fair was that a convergence of too many snack vendors badly spoiled the academic atmosphere of the book fair. Most of the visitors were found to have been visiting snack bars apart from book stalls. The apathy towards books depends totally upon familial ambience. It is a pity to note that senior members of families hardly have any urge to motivate the younger members towards developing reading habits.
Among the prominent books launched during this year's fair were Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri, Sanjib Sera 101 by Sanjib Chatterjee, Sanjib Chatterjee on Swami Vivekananda, Last One Hundred Collected short stories in Bengali, books by Ruskin Bond, and collected works of Jibananda Das by publishers from Dhaka.
The Milan Mela ground, opposite Science City Auditorium, is quite far from the main hubs of the city. Kolkata transport has now become the main bottleneck; hence it is difficult for quite a good number of people of the city as well as its the suburbs and the rural belt to visit the book fair. That is why turnout this year has not been up to expectations. For aged persons there is no proper place to relax. Along with elderly, the avid readers find it difficult to move within the short space available.

Sujayendra Das is a journalist based in Kolkata. He contributes regularly to some newspapers in Bangladesh