Quetta Literary Festival on June 27 and 28 at BUITEMS

Syed Muhammad Qaseem:

QUETTA: The Quetta Literary Festival (QLF) will be held tomorrow on 27th of June at the Balochistan University of Information Technology Engineering and Managment Sciences (BUITEMS) Quetta Takatu Campus. Artists, musicians, authors, journalists, thinkers and policy makers form all over Balochistan and Pakistan will participate in the festival. ” It is a mega event which gives us the chance to get together and share our views with each other” Dr. Faisal Ahmed Khan Kakar, the former Pro Vice-Chancellor of BUITEMS said.

As this Province is having a distorted picture in the minds of foreigners, so the main purpose of this Festival is to present a soft, true and positive image of Quetta and Balochistan. Most of the distinguished guests have already arrived in the provincial capital to participate in the QLF.

“This event will change the perception of the people about Balochistan”, Ayub Tareen

“This event will change the perception of the people about Balochistan”, Ayub Tareen, a senior Quetta-based journalist said.

Every year a large number of literary festivals are held all over the world. Basically the meaning of literary festival is book festival where authors and readers get together at a particular place to present a variety of works by the  authors with the aim to promote writings. “QLF should be extended to other parts of the province”, Muhammad Muzaffar, a student demanded.

This is the third QLF

These types of festivals are also held in the large cities of Pakistan. The Karachi Literary Festival (KLF), Lahore Literary Festival (LLF), the Children’s Literature Festival (CLF), the Teacher’s Literary Festival (TLF) and the Islamabad Literary Festival (ILF) and many more.

“People of Balochistan are thirsty for education”, Dr. Faisal Ahmed Khan said.

Simillar activities have been performed in Balochistan also such as the Gawdar Book Festival and Children’s Literary Festival in Turbat. Earlier in 2020 and 2021 the QLF was not possible due to COVID-19. But now due to ease of COVID BUITEMS is all set for the Festival, so the third edition of Quetta Literary Festival is held at BUITEMS on June 27-28.

QLF is a two day event at BUITEMS

Quetta Literary Festival (QLF) is a 2 days event and its aim is to promote art, literature, and discussions in context of Quetta Balochistan. This Festival is a place for  journalists, thinkers, artists, musicians, readers and art lovers. The QLF also brings policy makers of national and provincial level to discuss challenges faced to the province in a collaborative and interactive environment and seek the solutions of problems faced to the province. The Festival is helpful to bring different traditions together and conserve the cultural norms of different regions to bring peace, unity and tolerance in the province.

The QLF challenges the bleak and misconstructed picture of Quetta and Balochistan as a war and terror hit region. This Festival will sketch a picture of beauty and wisdom on the mental canvas of outsiders.

The author is a student of software engineering at BUITEMS. He can be contacted through Gmail: [email protected]