GUWAHATI, Oct 15 - Thousands of book lovers are visiting every day the Anwesha 11th Festival of Books for Children, which started at the Assam Engineering Institute (AEI) ground here on October 9 with a 10-day programme.
According to Anwesha president Paresh Malakar, on an average, around 4,000 book lovers are visiting the book festival daily. Almost 75 per cent of the visitors are schoolchildren and about 30 per cent of these students are brought to the festival ground by their respective educational institutions. Most of these schoolchildren are also taking part in the activities organised by the Anwesha as part of the festival.
This time, the theme of the festival is � �Water, sanitation and hygiene.� Around 2,500 students drawn from different city schools took part in the book march brought out in connection with the inauguration of the festival on October 9, waving placards on this theme, Malakar said.
One of the most remarkable events of the festival this time was a story-telling workshop conducted by Smt Jeeva Raghunath of Chennai on October 9 and 10. Over 300 students took part in the workshop and their performance in the workshop spectacular, said Malakar.
Again, around 200 schoolchildren interacted with the Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) Commissioner Narayan Konwar on the issue of keeping Guwahati clean and turning it into a green city, on October 13, in a manner that spoke of their keenness to develop their own city into a model one, said the Anwesha president.
In the general quiz competition, held as part of the festival today, 50 groups from as many city schools took part in the initial round.
Significantly, the participation of the vernacular-medium school students in the festival was also very much encouraging this time.
Tomorrow, a workshop on school library is being organised for the benefit of the primary school teachers. Thirty primary school teachers each from the Kamrup (Metro) and Kamrup districts are taking part in the workshop, which is considered as an important event in view of the Right to Education making school libraries compulsory, Malakar stated.
