It seems to have taken a pandemic to finally get the message across, but we’re off to a good start in 2022 with two of the world’s biggest book fairs dipping a hesitant toe in the digital water.
Regulars here at TNPS will know while I’m a huge fan of South Asia’s incredibly rich book fair scene, I’ve long urged the organisers to embrace digital rather than treat it as an enemy of books and reading.
It seems to have taken a pandemic to finally get the message across, but we’re off to a good start in 2022 with two of the world’s biggest book fairs dipping a hesitant toe in the digital water.
India’s Kolkata International Book Fair and the Amar Ekushey Boi Mela, the biggest cultural event in Bangladesh, both had digital elements this year – check out the mar Ekushey Boi mela website here – and while neither came even remotely close to fully embracing the digital advantage these are critical first steps.
The Bangladesh Boi Mela has somehow managed to run unnterrupted through the Pandemic years, just missing lockdown in 2020, thanks to its regular full-month-of-February slot, and putting on a show of sorts in 2021.
This year the Ekushey Boi Mela organisers, the Bangla Academy, made an initial estimate (usually revised upwards as final numbers are collated) of TDK 52.5 crore worth of books being sold. That’s TDK 525,000,000 in regular numbers, or about US $6.1 million.
Much is being made of the soaring increase over 2021, when sales barely reached $360,000, but the 2022 figure was subdued compared to the 2019 and 2018 hauls of around $10 million.
The fair is expected to return to its regular February slot next year, having been postponed to run half way through February and through to half way through March thanks to Covid-19 concerns.
