Srinagar, Nov 13 (IANS): The 239th session of the weekly meetings of the Jammu and Kashmir Fiction Writers Guild was held at the guild's head office, Abe Gazar Lal Chowk, Srinagar.

The meeting on Saturday was presided over by well-known columnist and Deputy Director Quality Assurance Kashmir University Shaukat Shafi, while on this occasion leading writer and former director of NIJ Vinita Bakshi was visiting from Delhi as a special guest, and leading fiction writer Abhay Singh was visiting from Punjab.

Fables were read in Urdu and English in the meeting, while Vinita Bakshi also presented some excerpts from her novel to the audience, which was discussed in a lively manner.

As per tradition, the session officially began with "Ibtaaiya" written by the young penman and teacher Mushtaq Baraq, presented by Engineer Shafi Ahmed.

Young fiction writer Nasir Zameer presented Urdu fiction while another young fiction writer Mahpara Riaz presented English fiction, which were discussed thoroughly. Several important points were raised during the discussion on myths, to which President Mahfil gave answers.

While expressing his views, the guest of the meeting, Abhay Singh expressed happiness and praised the activities of the guild.

The chief guest of the meeting, Vinita Bakshi, said she was happy to be a part of the guild meeting. He said that the guild seats in Kashmir Valley have impressed him a lot and congratulated all the members while expressing good wishes.

In his presidential speech, Shaukat Shafi praised the discussion that took place during the meeting. He said that such discussions will create quality literature. He further said that fiction was taking a new shape in the present era and the Internet has influenced it to a great extent.

Expressing concern over the decrease in the trend of reading books, he also gave many useful suggestions to remove this decrease.