People crowd around a stall to buy books at the Amar Ekushey Book Fair on Tuesday. Since it was the last day of the month-long event, scores of people flocked to the fair premises at Suhrawardy Udyan and Bangla Academy in Dhaka to purchase books of their choice. — FE Photo by KAZ Sumon The Amar Ekushey Book Fair 2023 concluded on Tuesday after attracting a large number of book lovers and visitors throughout the month.
According to the Bangla Academy, this year the fair sold books worth Tk 470 million approximately. Dr K M Muzahidul Islam, member secretary of the fair organising committee, disclosed it.
Before the pandemic, book sales in the fair amounted to Tk 820 million, Tk 800 million, Tk 754 million, Tk 654 million, Tk 405 million and Tk 219.5 million in 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016 and 2015 respectively.
This year, a total of 3,730 books arrived in the fair. On the last day, 267 new books hit the fair.
A large number of book lovers thronged the Bangla Academy premises and its adjacent Suhrawardy Udyan on the last day of the fair to take the last chance to buy books of their choices. Most of the visitors returned home from the fair carrying their favourite books. The sellers were also seen busy at their stalls to sell books.
Fariha Islam, a student of Dhaka University (DU), said she could not come to the book fair earlier, and so came on the last day to buy her listed books.
She expressed her happiness, as she could come to fair, but said the environment was noisy for huge crowd.
On the last day, the fair ran from 3:00 pm to 9:00 pm.
Bangla Academy Director General (DG) Mohammad Nurul Huda delivered the welcome speech in the ending ceremony, while its President Selina Hossain was in the chair.
State Minister for Cultural Affairs K M Khalid attended the event as the chief guest.
Mohammad Nurul Huda said after two years of the Covid-19 pandemic, the month-long Ekushey Book Fair looked very impressive and coordinated this year.
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