boi mela

i am evidently distraught and utterly crestfallen.For,being the person that i am,who prefers calling the glass half full rather than half empty,the book fair issue has come as a huge setback.surely this wasnt remotely one of my premonitions.i had had nightmares about the filmfestival being called off(well,it did reach a point when it really could.So...).I was even suspecting that the fair being held in park circus might churn newer controversies from varied quarters and get reaccomodated in Salt lake again.the fact that some KOLKATA BOOK FAIR might be held in a place that isnt really 'Kolkata' had got me mindboggled last year,but then i digress.
i frankly dont have any bones to pick with the environmentalists.they are after all doing their job,but i often wonder in solitude what they had been doing all these 30 years when the fair happenned in maidan with so much gusto.but what appalls me is the sheer indifference of the guild authorities.they seem to have forgotten that there exist some small publishers,people who diligently save every paisa throughout the year to publish little magazines, pamphlets,fliers and notebooks of suchkind so that they could sell them in the book fair with little or no profit.
people who care enough to ask you your name,where you have come from,offer you a seat so that you could rest a while before going stall hopping again.some would even shove a small magazine into your jhola and on being told that you dont have enough to pay him,would squeeze your hand and whisper "ami dilam.eta poro,bhalo lagbe".
This is what my boi mela is all about.
It feels nice watching people who have come all the way from distant provinces to buy books that they know wouldn't be available in their hometowns.some come simply to eat.some get their potraits made.and some bask in the sun,frolick and make merry as if they are on a picnic. and all this,while Protul Mukhopadhyay's "ami banglay gaan gai" reverberates the premise.
i remember times when i had gone simply to soak up the ambience and eventually bumped into old acquaintances who i knew i would meet again next year while browsing books or going stall hunting.
there were men who painted their faces,wore stilts and walked across the fair egging potential buyers to procure their publishings.i had always been enchanted by such men and when little had even tugged at baba's shirt so that he would slow down a little and let me devour the "tall man''s stunts,eyes agape.it pains me to think some tinylittle thing will be deprived of such fantasies this winter.that the "tall men" wouldn't be painting their faces for the mela this year.that the man in that makeshift Little Magazine counter wouldn't be shoving magazines down someone's jhola.that there would be no kid pulling at his father's panjabi so that he be taken to the shop of his fancy.
no regular visits to any swanky bookshop could possibly make up for the void that the non occurance of the boi mela creates. its a gamut of motley experiences that nothing else could conjure.nothing.
boi mela chai.boi mela hok.