It has not fallen prey to the temptation of marketing popular culture or reducing a literary festival to a mere celebrity PR exercise

When the postcolonial Indian society for decades have crudely practiced  what sociolinguists term as ‘ subtractive bilingualism’- where the acquisition of a second language is at the cost of the first language, the Gateway  Literary Festival has bravely sought to undo the damage by upholding ‘additive bilingualism’,where the acquisition and the presence of other language like English becomes an enriching and empowering phenomenon. Another remarkable achievement of Gateway Litfest is that , unlike many  other literary festivals, it has not fallen prey to the temptation of marketing popular culture or reducing a literary festival to a mere celebrity PR exercise which  is hardly of any use to literary cultures of our country. In all the editions, I had the fortune and the  honour to be the part of this culturally enriching and intellectually stimulating environment , for which I would like to thank the team Gateway Litfest and wish the very best for the forthcoming edition of the festival.