The 45th Chennai Book Fair, which came to an end on Sunday, saw roughly 15 lakh footfall and sales of books touched ₹15 crore, Book Sellers and Publishers Association of South India (BAPASI) that organised the fair said.
BAPASI president S. Vairavan told The Hindu that the response from the public was encouraging and it was better than last year. While the overall quantum of sales was encouraging, a few publishers said that it was skewed in favour of some big and popular publications. There were many publications that saw poor sales, they added.
The book fair, which used to be held in January, got pushed to February-March last year and this year due to COVID-19. Compared to the usual duration of 14 days, this year the book fair was held for 19 days, which included three weekends, to attract more crowd.
N. Sukumar, who came with his family from Thiruvanmiyur, said that they came because of the push from their teenage daughter, who wanted to buy a few books.
Kannan Sundaram, publisher, Kalachuvadu Publications, said the turnout and the sale was good. It was predominantly the youth who bought more books this year as well.
G. Olivannan, past vice-president of BAPASI, who heads Emerald Publishers, said although sales were good, they were not widely spread across the 800 stalls at the fair. “Most people came with a list of books or the stalls they wanted to visit. They visited those stalls and bought those books,” he said.
Poet and writer Manushyaputhiran, who runs Uyirmmai Publications, said the sales was satisfactory. He said the people were still recovering from the economic impact of COVID-19 because of which they did not have money to spend on books. However, he was hopeful about the fair attracting the youth. It was wrong to think that the youth had an aversion for reading books. “They are willing to deeply engage on any serious topic. But we need to find a language that is contemporary and appealing to them,” he said.
Mr. Sundaram said BAPASI should consider allocating more space to major publishers in the coming years. “Our publication has around 1,000 titles. Book fair is a place where we can display them. However, only 16 sq ft. space is allocated even if we are willing to pay more than twice the money for additional space,” he said.
