Why no social impact of literature festivals?

 Thursday, February 6, 2025

Islamabad (Point News Today/ Pakistan Point News - 15th Feb, 2025 ) It is difficult to say definitively in which year this trend of literary festivals started in Pakistan, but it is certain that for the last 15-16 years, regular programs have been organized in different cities, which are called ‘literary festivals’, and with each passing day, such programs are increasing and expanding.

In this, the Karachi Arts Council’s ‘World Urdu Conference’ started in 2008 and the Oxford University Press’s ‘Karachi Literature Festival’ in 2010 played a key role, and then these conferences and literature festivals started being held regularly every year in Lahore, Islamabad, Multan and Faisalabad.

Not only this, last year, the 'Pakistan Literature Festival' was also held in Quetta, and similarly, Amina Syed, the former spirit and spirit of Oxford University Press, has also started her own 'Literature Festival' for a few years now.

Apparently, the talk of literature, Urdu and books sounds so heartwarming. It seems that the love of literature is increasing in our society. People flock to these festivals, listen to the talks of domestic and foreign guests and writers, but the other side of this beautiful picture is that are these big literary activities that have been going on for many years also affecting our society?

Not much, just a little, is the tendency to read books or read anything increasing among us? Are any academic and literary effects seen towards language and literature from these literary festivals? Do various local and international topics that have become victims of obstacles in the general media and social media find a place in these annual literary gatherings?

If you answer honestly, the answers to all these questions are in the negative, just as the number of people with degrees is increasing in our society and the number of immoral or rude people is also increasing, in the same way, despite annual literary festivals and programs, tolerance and forbearance are getting farther and farther away in our society.

Book publishing is continuing to decline. The real topics and serious problems of our society are left, so the stakeholders who control our media and the global media determine their contents and priorities. Somehow, the same people are also involved in these literature festivals, so why can we expect anything new!

Then, by removing 'literature' from this literary festival, more attention is paid to the element of 'fair' only, it has been made an opportunity for marketing and advertising and entertainment for entertainment's sake.

Different literary groups and groups praise each other in the name of literature. In every city, the same faces appear again and again, topics from previous years are revived, people's attention is drawn by talking lightly controversially, or the sponsors of these programs want to target some change or social value in the society, so this seems like a regular platform for them.

That is, the same work that multinational companies are doing through NGOs, the same work is easily reached to the target audience through these conferences.

If these festivals are 'house full', then only then understand that this is considered the real success of the organizers. Now, how many serious people of literature actually came here? How comprehensive and rich the discussion was? Regardless of all this, the only goal is to gather a crowd.

For this, young boys and girls are invited from various private universities, very few of whom have had any literary training, they come here only under the compulsion of the campus and are seen taking selfies and making a lot of noise at the tea and coffee stalls.

In such a situation, we cannot even expect that anyone will be able to express constructive criticism on these Urdu conferences and literary festivals, the reason for this is the same ‘relationships’ and ‘lobbies’ that are present everywhere.

At the same time, those who dare to criticize are also socially boycotted, so no one seems ready to take this responsibility anymore. To be honest, it is necessary that instead of three-day festivals and conferences, it should be held for one day, but in a dignified manner and an attempt should be made to do justice to language, literature and society. At the same time, instead of general media and topics, social issues should be expressed in a creative way, so that the effects of such programs reach within our society and we can see some hope of positive change.

Note: The opinion expressed in any blog, comment or column of DW Urdu is the personal opinion of the author, with which it is not at all necessary for DW to agree.