Calcutta Bookfair

Boimela is only after durgapujo in my heart as the biggest bengali celebration. My first calcutta Bookfair memory goes back to 1986 when i was a small school student, it was an afternoon of  saraswati pujo i spent 2-3 hr with my parents,witnessed the love and madness of thousands of people for books, ate a kwality ice creme and baba-ma bought me " Upendrakishor and sukumar roysomogro" from Anando Publishers which i still have in my bookcase in kolkatar bari. Well it was the love at first sight and it was the beginning only. Since then up to 2001 when i left kolkata for USA i went to boimela with my parents and later with my friends every year without missing a single one.It was like an annual ritual which i adhere strictly. In the late 80s and in 90s i remember baba-ma always took me there on saraswati pujo afternoon to avoid huge crowd as lots of people were reluctant to touch books on that day. baba always use to buy Biographies of  great writers, scientists and ma always her favorite cook books of " Bela dey" or novels of Ashapurna devi and Gajendrakumar Mitra. I however stand in the queue of Anando to buy Feluda books , Ghonada series by Premendra Mitra, "Patrabharati" stall  for Narayan Debnath's  "Bantul The Great"," Handa-Vonda" or "Nonte-Fonte" series. Deb Sahitya Kuthir was also in my list for the reprint collection of Pujabarshiki books , Kishor Bharati for " Charmurtir kando karkhana" by Narayan gangopadhyay; but my all time favorite was all the science fiction based books for teen agers by Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay .I remember i read those in Sarodiya anandomela first then i bought the hard cover edition of them to make my personal collection, this way i build up  my classic sirshendu collection with " Potasgorer Jongole", " Pagla saheber kobor", " Manojder odbhut bari", " Bony", " Hirer angti" and lots of others.I also remember buying in the whole 90s every year Moti Nandi sports fiction books like "Striker", "Stopper," Jibon-ananto", " Nonida not out", Kony( which later adapted to an awesome movie) and the kalavati series. Then slowly i started going to boimela more with our group of college late afternoon class bunkers and with my Quiz group buddies.Apart from scanning quickly through our favorite bookstalls like "Ananda" again and again always, "Proma publishers for biography series", "Ekkhon for Kobitar boi,"," Mitra and Ghosh" for their amazing colelction of paper backs of classic bengali novels ,then at The "Anushtup" the famous place for ex-naxalites,aajkaal for their news sports books by debasish dutta, British council Library(BCL) for their collection of  precious books which we never had the money to purchase but can browse all the good ones at least!, USCIS for their catalogues and brochures about US schools and their popular magazine SPAN," "Penguin" for best best collection of english books, maps and dictionaries ,Bhromon stall to get new updates about traveling and other thousands of stalls for taking brief look at the front cover of all good books leisurely, Bookfair has numerous others charms like,hanging out there with friends;spending more time on endless gossiping, arguing on most famous topics like  ganguly or dravid  or over Mohunbagan-east bengal sitting on boimela dirty ground over newspaper sipping famous lebu-cha and munching Benfish er fish fry or fish pokora,budding poets requesting to buy a copy of their new creation in Little magazine section, Pottery arts and terracota arts from bankura, " chou-Nach" mask vendors from Purulia, Portrait painters, section of art college students with their amazing paintings and collages, some genius writing 100 words on a grain of rice, Story tellers mesmerizing tons of people with his short self made stories,ISKCON devotees giving free booklets with their mahaprosad, " Bawul nach" in a little space, workshops on literature and debate sessions at the Gild auditorium on controversial literary issues by famous bengali intellectuals, then ofcourse cruising through various food stalls on our low budget wallet for palatable snacks ,bumping unexpectedly with a known face and having a quick chat for few min was an extra charm always. Like many others i was a big fan of "The Statesman "and "Aaajkaal" stall for their amazing display of Pictures often satiring our funny politics and daily life.In bookfair i was fortunate enought to saw few celebrities like  Pandit ravishankar, French intellectual Jacques Derida,  Painter and writer Late Purnendu Potri, Poritosh sen and our own sunil ganguly, Sumon chattopadhyay, Basanta Chowdhury( my dad's favorite hero after Uttam kumar) and Nabanita Debsen once. I remember it was in 1999 or 1998 when Bangla band " Bhoomi" and Chandrabindu" are trying their best to have ground beneath their feet and we met once Anindya-da, Upal-da and Surojit da here.Our kolkata quiz community was regular here as several publication houses use to organize quick quiz sessions and instant ruffles.The horrible fire incident at the book fair still haunts me and then the resurrection of the next one within few days showed true spirit   of us-calcuttans. Then after 2001 it was  along 10 year absence, then in 2011 when i went there again on 2011 with payel and some of my other old friends it was truly truly a disappointing affair.The charm, glamour, charisma of the bookfair totally ruined as it shifted from it's park st-moidan location to this horrible place of bypass. I 100% support environmentalist mr. Subhas dutta and other well wishers of kolkata moidan saving soldiers, but i can't deny the fact that my bookfair whom i use to know is dead now. Beside this loaction and on top of that today's bookfair is dominated by showbiz, bangla channels promoting their upcoming mega serials, cell phone launching groups, business houses and others, nowadays,it is a place to launch your product, making profits of your business and less about books and love for literature.Due to space limitation many small publishers and little magazine stalls  stopped coming here, due to it's pathetic location  it is a nightmare to commute here and the big sharks are the only one on this ocean now.Hope someday the Booksellers Gild , our state ministry and Green bench can come to a concuring point and take it back to it's birthplace without compromising with the greenery of moidan and pollution issue. anyway took some pics of 2011 boimela and posting them. Unfortunately i didn't took any snaps of my old boimela , but it's in my mind and memory all the time and i can develop, print and enlarge whenever i want closing my eyes.