EVEN as personalities like Prime Minister Narendra Modi, NCP (S-P) chief Sharad Pawar and Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who are known for their oratory skills were present, 86-year-old Tara Bhavalkar stole the limelight as she emphasised the role of Marathi language and the Marathi Sahitya Sammelan in the modern world during the inauguration of the 98th Marathi Sahitya Sammelan in New Delhi on Friday.“When the Sahitya Sammelan started, it was considered to be one which belonged to few select classes of people…Mahatma Phule had criticised the sammelan, saying it belongs to the upper class and has nothing to do with the labour class….Today, it has become all-encompassing,” said Bhavalkar, the current president of the Marathi Sahitya Sammelan.Bhavalkar debunked those who called themselves educated, but do not have wisdom. She said after the British era ended, a question that was being discussed was who should be called the educated? “It was believed that those who can read and write are educated. …After the British era, schools and colleges were set up and people started learning. The labour class and women started learning. Till that time, it was thought that all are uneducated. Today, if someone has not attended school, he is termed as illiterate…. However, just reading and writing does not mean that one has wisdom. An educated person without wisdom is meaningless,” she said.Bhavalkar’s speech went down well with the crowd as they applauded her fulsome.Even Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis were impressed by her oratory and knowledge of the Marathi language. ”Chhaan (good..,” the Prime Minister told her. “When I said ‘chhaan’ to her, she replied in Gujarati…,” said the Prime Minister. The Chief Minister said, “I don’t think I need to speak now that Tara Bhavalkar has delivered such an admirable speech and when the Prime Minister is still to speak,” he said.Books drawing crowds…Besides the octogenarian Tara Bhavalkar who won the hearts of the literary community as well as the people from different walks of life, books written in Marathi in different subjects also were lapped up by the visiting crowd. Several stalls have been set up at the Talkatora stadium–the main venue of the sahitya sammelan.Among the best sellers include ‘Chhaava,’ written by Shivaji Sawant. The Hindi movie of the same name has created quite a buzz in the country. Even the Prime Minister made a mention of it during his speech at the Vigyan Bhavan.Story continues below this ad“We have almost run out of the ‘Chhaava’ copies…we will have to bring in more copies…Besides Chhaava, even ‘Mrutunjay,’ is also popular among the visitors,” said Balaji D of the Shivam Sahitya, a publishing house which has put up a stall at the Sahitya Sammelan venue.BARTI (Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Research and Training Institute) has also put up a stall at the venue. BARTI is selling books at nearly 70-80 per cent discount. The best seller book of BARTI was ‘The Constitution of India.’ Vaishnav Hazare, a student who is preparing for UPSC exam, said, “The cost of the book is nearly Rs 470 and I have got for Rs 70.”One of the prominent visitors was P D Patil, Chancellor of the Dr D Y Patil Vidyapeeth. He went around the stalls and selected a few books. “I love reading books…I have selected a few of them,” Patil said as he interacted with the literary community.Ramrao Satvekar, Narsinha Pant Wangmay Stall, Balekundri, Belgaum, said, “People are evincing interest in books especially the spiritual kind.”Story continues below this adSachin Dhankude of Kothrud, Pune, who has set up a stall to sell his books on election symbol said, “I am getting response from the crowd. I am explaining to them the futility of election symbols…I am happy that the sahitya sammelan has given me an opportunity to showcase my thoughts and ideas.”Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd