But isolated instances aside, we’re still a long way from seeing Bangladeshi, let alone Pakistani, publishers meaningful participating as national representatives in the Kolkata International Book Fair or the New Delhi World Book Fair.

South Asia publishing is never straight-forward, with political and religious tensions ever ready to disrupt industry attempts to get along.

Earlier this year there was talk of reviving the defunct Dhaka International Book Fair in Bangladesh, to compliment the massive public-facing Amar Ekushey Boi Mela, which this year attracted 6 million visitors over its month-long duration.

The Dhaka International Book Fair, if it returns, will be an attempt to redress the imbalance and allow Bangladeshi publishers to showcase their wares to the world, and for foreign publishers to meet face to face with their Bangladeshi counterparts and gain some traction in this market of 167 million people, 129 million of whom are online.

For now, that’s still a maybe, but meantime we have a very likely joint India-Bangladesh book fair to be held in Dhaka in July, and a for certain book fair to take place in south Kolkata this month.

The latter is the Nababarsha Boi Utsab in South Kolkata running from April 16 for ten days, to mark the Bengali New Year. The event is being cited as a mini-version of the Kolkata International Book Fair.

The Nababarsha Boi Utsav will be marking its second edition, and hopes to improve on the Rs 1 crore ($122,000) worth of books sold in 2021.

Its big sister the Kolkata IBF was slightly larger, earlier this year pulling in 2.5 million visitors and seeing $3 million worth of books sold.

Then in May the Publishers and Booksellers’ Guild of Kolkata will head off to Dhaka to meet its Bangladeshi counterpart, and the June fair will be finalised, with 25-30 Kolkata publishers expected to participate.

These are positive steps, and this year began with the Bangladesh Book Fair in Kolkata, with publishers from Bangladesh crossing the border to participate.

But isolated instances aside, we’re still a long way from seeing Bangladeshi, let alone Pakistani, publishers meaningful participating as national representatives in the Kolkata International Book Fair or the New Delhi World Book Fair.

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