Kathmandu, October 11

Over two-week long long ‘Great Book Exhibition-2015’ jointly organised by Sajha Prakashan and Nepal Academy concluded today.

According to Dolindra Prasad Sharma, president and general manager of Sajha Prakashan, the book fair was organised with the theme ‘Save Sajha’ but the fair could not collect as much fund from sales as expected. “We had expected to collect Rs 5 million from book sales but we could only collect Rs 1 million,” said Sharma. He stated they had collected Rs 25,000 on the first day, Rs 100,000 on the second day and Rs 125,000 on the third day but sales dropped from the fourth day as people could not visit the fair due to shortage of petroleum products.

“Many Constituent Assembly members, senior politicians and academics had promised to visit the fair and purchase books worth Rs 20,000 each, but they could not visit the fair,” he added.

Sajha Prakashan had expected to make a good collection so that it could provide Dashain allowance to its staff, but low turnout of visitors to the fair has thrown cold water on its plans.

“We had planned to organise book exhibition in 15 places across the country but we had to cancel our plans due to ongoing agitation in the Tarai,” he said, adding that they could organise the exhibition only in Kathmandu.

He stated that Sajha was going to provide Rs 10,000 as Dashain allowance to its staff and that a board meeting would be held on October 13 to take a decision on further support to its staff.

Thousands of books were put on display at the exhibition. Sajha Prakashan and Nepal Academy had offered 25 to 50 per cent discount on the purchase of books at the exhibition. The exhibition had started on September 22.