French Culture minister Francoise Nyssen will confer "Legion of Honour", the highest civilian award from that country, to noted Bengali thespian Soumitra Chatterjee at the 42nd edition of International Kolkata Book Fair to be inaugurated on January 31.
The French minister will confer the honour to Soumitra Chatterjee, who is a great actor and a great intellectual figure of Bengal, as a tribute to the legend, Consul General of France in Kolkata, Damien Syed told reporters here today.
"Nyssen will also inaugurate the French pavalion which will be a very innovative interactive digital artistic creation," he said adding around 10 renowned writers from France will also be gracing the 5th Kolkata Literature Festival to be held as part of the book fair from February 8 to 10.
To a request by the General Secretary of the book fair organisers, Publishers & Booksellers' Guild General Secretary Tridib Chatterjee, the French Consul General said, "since the French minister will be present at the functions organised by French embassy, she can be present at the inaugural programme as well."
The 42nd International Kolkata Book Fair will begin on January 31 and conclude on February 11, 2018.
About the organisers declaring France as the 'focal theme' of the coming Kolkata Book Fair, the Consul General said, "France will be the partner country, friend county, theme country - whichever way you describe it."
"Kolkata International Book Fair is a big event in the country and France is proud to be chosen as the theme country for the third time," he said.
Launching the logo BonjourIndia Indo-French festival, the French envoy said the three words in the caption 'innovation-creativity-partnership' summed up the strong Indo-French bonding.
"It is (BonjourIndia) all about sustainable development, it is about culture, it is about people to peope contacts to renew the ties, it is about education, it is about research work. The book fair will be a wonderful stage to showcase all these facets," he said.
The closing ceremony of BonjourIndia Festival, which had already begun recently and will be hosted in 33 Indian cities, will take place at the Kolkata Book Fair, he said adding it will be a unique cultural show.
Kolkata Literature Festival Director Sujata Sen said the literary festival, which will enter the fourth year, is already getting international recognition and is the only one of its kind where the common people can have access.
"There will be 10 French writers among the other international guests and there will be interactive sessions with local audiences and writers," she said.
To a question Chatterjee said, while the book fair did neither notch up any profit nor loss in last year possibly due to demonetisation and Rs 21 crore book sales were reported, "This year we hope the situation could be better and greater number of people will come and buy books."
Chatterjee said the number of stalls could be lesser as the new venue at Central Park, Salt Lake, will be smaller in size than Milan Mela but the new ground has all the infrastructure ready for hosting such an event.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee will inaugurate the show, which is the world's largest book fair in terms of turnout of public.
Last year 20 lakh people had visited the Milan Mela grounds which had been hosting the book fair for past couple of years.
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