Kolkata: Indranil Sen, Minister of State for Tourism, urged Sishu Kishore Academy to take the initiative to organise Rajya Sishu Kishore Utsav for six days from next year.
The Utsav this year, under the tagline "Ahladey paanch Din", began on Saturday at the newly set up Ektara (Rabindra Sadan Mukta Mancha).
It has been inaugurated by Sen. Principal Secretary of the Information and Cultural Affairs (I and CA) Department Vivek Kumar, poet
Subodh Sarkar and president of the Sishu Kishore Academy that functions under the
supervision of I and CA department Arpita Ghosh were also present in the inaugural programme.
When requested, Sen didn't light the lamp to mark the inauguration of the Utsav. Instead he called little Adrija Bagh, who sang the inaugural song, and requested her to light the lamp. He later said since it is a festival for the children, there could be nothing better than getting the lamp lighted by a small girl to mark the inauguration.
After explaining the significance of such a festival as it helps in bringing out the talent within children, Sen said: "I would like to urge so that the festival continues for six days from next year onwards instead of five."
This year, the festival will continue for five days from Saturday. It may be mentioned that this is the 10th Rajya Sishu Kishore Utsav.
In this connection, Sen took a dig at the erstwhile Left Front government stating that "everyone knows very well how the Academy used to function before 2011 and everyone has witnessed how it is functioning for the past six years after the Mamata Banerjee government came to power. So I would like to consider this year's Utsav to be the sixth one instead of 10th".
The minister added that last year the Chief Minister had suggested the setting up of a permanent open air stage at Rabindra Sadan premises. The stage has been constructed as per the design prepared by the Chief Minister and she has named it "Ektara".
The Rajya Sishu Kishore Utsav 2017 is the first programme to take place in the newly built open air stage, where there could be round the year programmes to attract more tourists.
The Kolkata International Children's Film Festival this year will take place from January 19-27.
More than 200 films will be screened at the festival.