Chief minister Mamata Banerjee will inaugurate the 46th international Kolkata Book Fair on 30 January at 2pm, said Tridib Chatterjee, general secretary of the Publishers and Booksellers Guild today. Mr Chatterjee said because of the prior engagement of Miss Banerjee the time of inauguration had been brought forward from 4.30pm to 2pm.

The theme country at the book fair is Spain. Officials of the guild, along with senior police officers, those from public health engineering department, Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority (KMDA), Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation (BMC), municipal affairs department conducted a survey at the Central Park ground in Salt Lake where the book fair will be held. It will be thrown open to the public on January 31.

Mr Chatterjee said around 900 big, medium and small stalls would be set up and two huge halls where well-known international publishing houses like Harper Collins, Penguin among others will put up their stalls. He said the guild would request the Metro rail authorities to run services from Sealdah station to Sector V on Sundays. Watch towers will be put up and CCTV cameras will be installed for the safety and security of the visitors.

Mr Chatterjee said the food stalls would have their cooking arrangement outside the fair ground for the safety of the visitors. There would be a permanent control room which would be manned by the personnel of the fire and emergency services department. KMDA will put up decorative coloured lights outside the fair ground and do the landscaping.

The WBSEDCL will illuminate the venue while the Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation will do the daily sweeping and cleaning. The PHE will provide drinking water and there will be an adequate number of bio toilets. Senior police officers said there will be arrangements to park vehicles and the crowd would be controlled to avoid any kind of untoward incident.

Through the public address system the visitors will be informed about the public transports. Mr Sudhangshu Dey, president of the Publishers and Booksellers Guild sought cooperation from everyone to make the Kolkata International Book Fair a grand success. After two years of Covid, the Book fair is going to be a grand show once again, he maintained.