Last evening when I made my way through the book-clutching crowds thronging the International Kolkata Book Fair at Central Park in Salt Lake, I felt that the city’s spirit of enquiry was soaring. The book stalls had long queues, almost everyone had a bagful of books, there were animated discussions going on in several stalls, and ordinary people just hawking their magazines or books to every passerby. This atmosphere, celebrating books and ideas, is unique in the country, and according to all foreign visitors, not found anywhere else in the world.

I was quite amused to see a Facebook post by a friend in Bangalore showing the visual of a stall in the Book Fair where the banner said “kagoj dekhabo na” and beneath that “kaaj de na”, with her comment “take that arty fairs”. Three young men standing near the main entrance in front of the Guild Office had an anti NRC-CAA-NRP poster hanging from their necks in silent protest. Freedom of expression and the right to protest was in full form, throbbing and alive.

A few feet away in the main auditorium people were reeling with laughter and falling off their chairs listening to humorist-writer Sanjib Chattopadhayay regale people with life’s idiosyncracies. This was followed by a session on poetry with hundreds of people participating. A few moments later a whole delegation from Latin America were planning their award-winning author’s session for the following day.

The seventh edition of the Kolkata Literature Festival, in association with The Telegraph, will kick off on Thursday, February 6, within this context and within this plurality of views, where everyone has a voice and where there is no proselytizing. With over 85 writers and thinkers from five countries — Russia, France, Australia, Britain and Bangladesh — discussing and debating over three days, and into 25 sessions, books, literature, arts, cinema, history, music, magic and, of course, politics and current affairs, it will wear a true festive atmosphere that also has the cause that voices should be heard.

Actor-editor Soumitra Chatterjee will inaugurate the Kolkata Literature Festival and deliver the keynote on the importance of little magazines which boomed in the Seventies challenging the establishment, and the healthy tradition continues. With Russia as the focal theme for the Book Fair, there will be four eminent Russian writers — Petr Aleshkovsky, Galina Yuzefovic, Anna Goncharova and Natalya Volkova — discussing culture, the critic’s role and children’s writing.

This year, the festival will institute the annual Nabaneeta Dev Sen Memorial Lecture focusing on children’s literature, to be first delivered by her daughter Nandana Dev Sen, an award-winning children’s writer herself. The Apeejay Jit Paul Memorial Lecture will have Vir Sanghvi, whose book the The Gamechangers: Transforming India has just been published, speak of India in transition. Shashi Tharoor will be speaking on ‘Disorder, Darkness’… and the audience as in previous years, will lap it up.

There will be three very special Bangla sessions, with very special people participating. The first one will celebrate ‘Jahar-Bhanu: Eksho Bocchorer Hashyorosh’ with those who have known them from close — Madhabi Mukherjee, Sabitri Chatterjee, Chandan Sen and Sanjoy Mukhopadhyay. Another debate will cover 200 years’ legacy of Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar and the third one will focus on 50 years of Muktijuddho.

The festival could not have looked away from current issues pre-occupying our minds which need open debate and discussion. There will be three sessions in partnership with Citizenspeak — ‘Violence is Our Way of Life’ with political psychologist Ashis Nandy, historian Aparna Vaidik and former bureaucrat-turned-activist Jawhar Sircar; ‘We are Who We Elect’ will have Aparna Sen and Shashi Tharoor joining Ashis Nandy; and ‘Why should the Citizen Speak’ with Parambrata Chattopadhyay, Rupam Islam, Anupam Roy, Koushik Sen, Aparna Sen and Piya Chakraborty.

The ‘Woman in 2020’ session will have Annie Zaidi, acid-attack survivor Reshma Qureshi and British author Mariam Khan talk about identity and survival. New light will be thrown on history through the recent, much-acclaimed books by Sudeep Chakravarti on Plassey and Avik Chanda on Dara Shukoh. New writers and their first books, going into web series and films, will be another attraction, and the question ‘Who Decides What We Read’, in an age of marketing, inspirational talks by authors, social media bombardment will be debated hotly.

Calcutta and sports are sinseparable. By celebrating 100 years of George Telegraph, a club that has enhanced both sports and education, the story of different sporting genres will be related by sportspersons and sports journalists.

P.C. Sorcar and his Australian biographer John Zubrzycki will add that touch of magic that cannot keep you away. All three evenings will be wrapped up with enthralling music by Usha Uthup, Debojyoti Mishra and Sourendro-Soumyojit.

Here’s a warm invitation to the Kolkata Literature Festival supported by The Telegraph. Read books and debate your heart out and emerge therapeutised.

The author is the director, Kolkata Literature Festival and CEO, Future Hope. The 7th Kolkata Literature Festival starts on February 6 within the 44th International Kolkata Book Fair