The Hindu

Mangalore, May 12: It is the most eagerly awaited event by bibliophiles of "amchi" Mumbai and "namma Bengaluru".

Thanks to Vidya Virkar, even residents of Kudla will now have the opportunity to be part of the Strand Book Festival being organised for the first time here in association with Mangalore University. The nine-day event will get under way on Saturday.

A speciality of the annual festival is the mind-boggling discounts that Strand offers.

There will be a discount of 20 per cent to a staggering 80 per cent. Book festivals in Mumbai and Bangalore attract book lovers by the dozens, says Virkar.

Virkar has chosen Ravindra Kala Bhavan on the premises of University College for her maiden book exhibition here.

The university Registrar K Sundar Naik will inaugurate the event on Saturday. The festival will remain open from 10 am to 8 pm up to May 21.

Virkar said that books in all categories including fiction, literature, classics, management, self-help, popular science, history and so on would be on show.

"We have brought in nearly 2,000 boxes of books in three truckloads. It will be our endeavour to get people here to read high-quality international standards books through the festival," she said. I am testing the local market through this festival. It is in my personal interest to open an outlet of Strand in a place from where my father T N Shanbhag hails. I also intend to bring him here for its inauguration,'' she said.

"We in Strand do not believe in too much diversification for it will dilute our equity,'' she said when asked if she had plans to go in for publishing.