On the first day of the year, students were elated by the smell of new books. The guardians also join the book festival with great enthusiasm and fanfare.

The book festival is being held centrally on Monday (January 1) morning at the National Government Primary School premises of Mirpur in the capital.

Director General of the Department of Primary Education Shah Rezwan Hayat presided over the ceremony.

The ministries have taken necessary steps to distribute 30,70,83,517 copies of new textbooks among 3,81,28,324 students throughout the country.

The government has so far distributed over 464,78,29,883 copies of free textbooks among students up to secondary levels across the country since 2010.

Since 2017, the government has been distributing braille books among visually impaired students alongside distributing Chakma, Marma, Tripura, Garo and Sadri version books among students from the ethnic groups to study in their mother languages.