Pune: The annual Pune Book Festival will commence on Dec 12 and continue till Dec 20 in Fergusson College.This festival can overtake Delhi Book Fair in popularity within a year or two due to growing public participation and the city’s strong reading culture, said veteran litterateur Vishwas Patil on Friday. The president of the 99th Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Sahitya Sammelan was speaking at the inauguration of the main office for the festival’s fourth editionOrganised by the National Book Trust (NBT) in collaboration with the Pune Municipal Corporation, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Fergusson College and Samarth Yuva Foundation, the festival aims to promote reading.“People in Pune have immense love for books and authors. The festival has become an event owned by the people of Pune, and their enthusiastic participation is commendable,” Patil said.He expressed concern that people were gradually moving away from reading, with books becoming less visible during train and bus journeys. However, he said the festival was helping revive the reading habit and stressed that knowledge and research remained essential in the digital age.SPPU vice-chancellor Suresh Gosavi said the festival was giving Pune a distinct identity as a city that nurtures reading, bringing together students, parents, researchers and teachers.Festival chief coordinator Rajesh Pande said the event was a reading movement rather than merely an event. He added that the initiative had also inspired Marathi residents in Singapore to organise a campaign titled ‘Shantata… Singapore Vachat Aahe’ (Silence… Singapore is reading).
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