Get back to books, speakers urge

January 05, 2010 02:52 pm | Updated November 17, 2021 07:00 am IST - VIJAYAWADA

With a message: Inmates of SKCV Children’s Trust participate in ‘Walk for Books’ in Vijayawada on Monday. Photo: CH.Vijaya Bhaskar

With a message: Inmates of SKCV Children’s Trust participate in ‘Walk for Books’ in Vijayawada on Monday. Photo: CH.Vijaya Bhaskar

“Books play key role in transfer of knowledge from one generation to another. Use of simple language and affordable rates offered by publishers can promote book-reading,” said K.I. Varaprasad Reddy, Managing Director of Hyderabad-based Shantha Biotechnics Ltd., here on Monday.

Addressing a meeting that followed the annual ‘Walk for Books’, organised as part of the ongoing book festival at Swaraj Maidan to promote book reading, Dr. Reddy lamented the declining trend of book reading and attributed it to the ‘virulent’ modes of entertainment churned out by various television channels. Time constraint in this jet age was yet another major issue, as people had just enough time to browse through newspaper headlines.

Making an appeal to newspaper managements and television channels not to feed their readers and viewers on ‘sensational’ inputs, Mr. Reddy said it was time to wake up to the need to save the book from extinction. “A book is a good friend. It initiates a silent conversation with you. Use books as gifts for any occasion. A book is the best fuel for the brain,” he urged.

The ‘Walk for Books’ was flagged off at Press Club by Tankasala Ashok, Editor of Telugu daily ‘Vaartha’. Children of SKCV Children’s Trust and a couple of local schools participated in the silent march.

At the meeting, Mr. Ashok said it was unfortunate that the youth of the day were not patronising books in a big way. “Barring academic books, competitive books or those related to personality development, there are no takers for literature or science fiction,” he rued.

The invasion of the small screen in bedrooms and growing materialism were the actual culprits for the decadent culture that had set in.

But the recent trend showing increase in sale of books provided the much-needed glimmer of hope, he felt.

Eluru Range DIG of Police and in-chare Commissioner of Police Mahesh M. Bhagawat, who presided over the function, observed that the present generation was focussed on ‘exam-oriented’ reading.

Calling for efforts to promote what he called ‘realistic’ literature, he said literature, author and society were always inter-linked.

“This kind of realistic literature is always welcome,” he maintained. President of the Vijayawada Book Festival Society D. Ashok Kumar, vice-president I. Rama Kumar, secretary B. Babjee, joint secretary A. Pavan Kumar and others were present on the occasion.

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