Karachi is known as the city of lights and it’s full of hustle bustle. There is a huge number of Karachites who have this strong inclination towards reading, or let’s say they are addicted to read good books. Keeping that in mind, recently in Karachi, the 10th Annual Karachi International Book Fair (KIBF) was organized from 19th December to 22nd December. The event was organized by the Pakistan Publishers and Booksellers Association, for the 10th time at Expo Center, Karachi. Just like always the event received a huge number of visitors i.e. book lovers from different parts of Karachi.
In this particular event 350 stalls were set up and more than a hundred publishers and distributors exhibited their books. From original editions to used books, autobiographies to textbooks and poetry to history books were displayed and showcased for the visitors. In comparison to the previous years, the number of books for children had increased phenomenally. These books included interactive, easy to understand and animated ones. This encouraged numerous parents to buy books for their children and maybe this might sow the seed of book reading in the hearts of our new generation. In the Hall 2, most of the stalls were dedicated to religious books. It was heartwarming to witness a massive collection of religious books penned by some prominent authors and scholars of different eras under one roof.
Books from multiple languages including English, Urdu, Punjabi etc. were available on the stalls at discounted prices. Major publication names of Pakistan participated in this event. Oxford University Press, Paramount Books, Gaba Books, Liberty Books, Faiz-e-Mushtaq, Children Publications, Fiction House Lahore, Learners’ Educational Publishers, Federal Urdu University, EMKAY Books International, Hachett Children’s Book and countless others were just a few names that participated and displayed some great books.
Hall 1, 2 and 3, all were dedicated to 10th Annual KIBF. It was evident by the crowd that they enjoyed every minute of their visit as everyone was so much involved in going through the huge collection of books and buying the ones that they liked. These kinds of events are very helpful in building good habits for the entire nation. Especially for kids, such events unfold a great opportunity to learn and understand different things from multiple aspects of life which include poetry, history, science, fiction, and others.
Let’s hope that such kind of events are organized on usual basis, this will actually aid in building a nation and making it “reading friendly” that is the dire need of time.
