At the ongoing World Book Fair the dominating influx of visitors at the China pavilion is evident but, what cannot be ignored is the relatively deserted state of the stalls put up by other countries.
Around 30 countries are participating in the 24th edition of the Book Fair have been housed in Hall no 7 at Pragati Maidan, the venue for the Fair.
The hall contains three pavilions among which, one is completely dedicated to China that has been accorded 'Guest of Honor' status, the second pavilion is named 'Cultural Heritage of India' which witnesses live performances from artists as 'Vividh Bharat' is the theme of this year's book fair.
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While some have been up front about China grabbing all the attention, others have attributed the negligible footfall to other reasons.
Pakistani publisher Al Hasanat Books, who primarily deals in the import and export of Islamic literature said it has been participating in the fair for the last four years and it is for the first time that their stall has been this empty.
"It is because all the people are going straight away to the China pavilion that we don't have any visitors. That is the reason," says a representative of Al Hasanat.
Sri Lanka Book Publishers Association which has been participating in the fair for over 15 years now, is relatively restrained in accusing the guest of honour country in vacuuming the crowd.
"The footfall is definitely less and we do see a lot of people heading towards the China pavilion. So, China might or might not be the reason," says a representative.
Dharmendra Sujeebun from a Mauritius-based publishing company seconded its Sri Lankan counterpart acknowledging that the footfall not just at his stall but also at the book fair is general seems to have decreased.
"I think young people are reading less books these days. Now they do everything online. That is very sad," says Sujeebun.
The International Bureau of French Publishing from France has collaborated with Oxford store here to market its publications. While they refused comment on the contribution of China Pavillion in drawing crowds, they did not deny scanty number of visitors.
"More than anything else, I think the change of location in the hall has affected us most. Earlier we were right at the entrance, which was a very prime position as it was difficult for visitors to miss the stall," says a representative.
The stall set up by Instituto Cervantes, which is a public institution founded by the Spanish government to promote the Spanish language across the world, is yet to attract enough visitors by Wednesday afternoon.
"The stall was better placed last year and that's why we attracted many people, this year we are given the position in the corner," says Bharat, who was a student at the institute and is now volunteering at the Fair.
It is usual for the public to head straight into the more highlighted pavilions, ignoring the 'Events Corner', which hosts a number of stalls from countries like France to Singapore.
"It's not like people are not there, but they are in the nearby pavilions, not here. We had people on the first two days though," Bharat adds.
However, Carlos, librarian at the institute, is not amused by the fact that people are not interested to visit their stall.
"I don't know, maybe. There are people in the adjoining halls," he says.
The stall did have a lot to offer. Like books on Spanish cinemas and theaters.
"We had a lot of things in common with India like theatre and cinemas. However, we are much smaller than Bollywood. But our film industry churns out 2,000 cinemas every year and that's too much for a population that we have back in Spain," he says.
On the similar lines, the stall set up by the Polish Institute in Delhi, is unperturbed by the lack of people and an intern, Anaa, gives an insight on what's special this year at the stall.
"We have a quite big section on illustrative books as most people recognise that Polish graphic art is deceptive," she says.
"We also have Polish books translated to Hindi like 'Khula Ghar,' and 'Shaho ke Shah,'" she adds.
The Polish Institute comes under the cultural wing of the Polish Embassy.
According to information from the National Book Trust more than one lakh book lovers visited the Fair on January 10, a day after it began. The Book Fair is set to conclude here on January 17.
