Bookworms: Children’s Literature Festival to kick off

KARACHI:

The 16th Children’s Literature Festival (CLF) will take place in the city on February 26 to February 28 at the Arts Council of Pakistan.

The first day of the festival will be dedicated to teachers and will be titled, Teachers’ Literature Festival.

The festival is being organised by the Oxford University Press (OUP) along with the ‘I Am Karachi’ campaign.

OUP’s managing director and co-founder of CLF Ameena Saiyid and CLF’s programme manager Maham Ali, shared these details at a press conference held at the Arts Council on Wednesday.  They were accompanied by I Am Karachi’s Rumana Husain and the secretary of the Arts Council, Ahmed Shah.

The organisers claimed that they were expecting a high turnout at the three-day festival this year.

“The situation in Karachi has affected our children badly,” said Saiyid. “By organising such events, we can provide our children with a ray of hope.”

According to Shah, they were also planning on holding an open discussion with political parties. “This will be done under the ‘I Am Karachi’ banner,” he said. “We will request them to sit and come up with a single-point agenda for peace in the city.” He added that literature and art festivals were recognised all over the world and should be covered by the media to show a positive image of Karachi.

As a tribute to the children who lost their lives in a militant attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar, a painting exhibition is also being organised.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 12^th, 2015.