New Delhi World Book Fair 2016 opens, targets young readers

The book fair, organised by the National Book Trust (NBT), India, an autonomous body under the ministry of human resource development, and the India Trade Promotion Organisation (ITPO), is on from 9 to 17 January 2016 at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi.

The 24th edition of the Fair was inaugurated on 9 January by Union minister for human resource development Smriti Zubin Irani. “Today we not only celebrate the exponential growth of the publishing business both in India and China but also the human interest in it,” Irani said. She also appreciated the efforts of NBT in creating a platform for young writers to publish their works.

Popular Kannada author SL Bhyrappa was the guest of honour at the function.

This year, China will be the Guest of Honour Country at the NDWBF. On the occasion, Sun Shoushan, vice-minister of SAPPFRT, People’s Republic of China, said, “India is an amazing country with a profound and diversified culture. I am amazed by the rapid development of India, which seems to be at a colourful corridor that connects its glorious past with the present.”

According to Rita Chowdhury, director, National Book Trust, India, the rescheduling of dates was a deliberate move, and it was to facilitate more involvement from the young readers. “One of NBT’s mandates is to spread the love of literature among young people. As the exam season for Class X and XI students begin around February-March, we had noticed in the last editions of the Fair that school students missed out on attending it. Therefore, we decided to reschedule the event so that more and more students can come and be a part of the book culture that the Fair promotes,” she said.

And rightly so. After all, NBT is one of the country’s largest publishers of children’s books, in all Indian languages.

In a bid to attract young readers to the NDWBF, NBT has also spread the word among the schools, not just in Delhi and its vicinity, but across the country, with the help of the organisation’s regional centres. “We have sent out information about our activities to the majority of schools and colleges. We understand that more needs to be done in this regard and we are working toward it,” Chowdhury, who took over the charges as the director in July last year, said.

In the recent years, the Chinese government has attached great importance to China Country of Honour Programmes at the international book fairs so as to further strengthen the exchanges and cooperation between China and the other countries. Following the Country of Honour presentations in many international book fairs, including Frankfurt Book Fair (2009), London Book Fair (2012), Book Expo America (2015), China has been invited to Delhi. The Guest of Honour Country pavilion will showcase rich volumes of Chinese books, professional forums and seminars, cultural exhibitions, and literature salons, to foster and promote literary and cultural ties between India and China as well as the bilateral people-to-people exchanges.

Apart from the participation of publishers from across the country and abroad, along with some big-name printers, the two regular business oriented events at NDWBF would be the CEOSpeak and the New Delhi Rights Table.

Organised by NBT and FICCI, CEOSpeak over Chairman’s Breakfast is a B2B event on the sidelines of the fair, which encourages publishing CEO's and senior executives share and exchange ideas about Indian and international book trade.

The New Delhi Rights Table, on the other hand, offers a unique opportunity for publishers from across the world to meet each other on a one-to-one basis to tentatively finalise their interest and agreements for transfer of translation rights available in English, Hindi and other Indian languages. One of the major aims of this facility is to promote Indian books abroad and to facilitate business interactions to buy/sell translation rights between Indian publishers and foreign publishers. The event has been scheduled for 11-12 January 2016.

There will also be other regular events like Authors’ Corner, offering platforms to authors to promote their books, seminars and discussions, and literary and cultural programmes.

This year, the theme of NDWBF is ‘Vividh Bharat’ which will showcase the diversity of writing and publishing in India, from the days of bhojpatra and palm-leaf manuscripts to eBooks, and everything in between.    

Coinciding with NDWBF, the German Book Office, New Delhi, the South Asia node of the Frankfurt Book Fair, has organised the Globalocal Talk 2016, a forum designed for publishing and allied industries, which will highlight interesting rights territories like France, the UK, China, Germany and India. Speakers from these markets will offer an in-depth analysis and updates on their markets, both print and digital, along with guidance on how to successfully buy and sell rights in their territories.

The event will be held on 13 January 2016, at the Seminar hall, Hall 7, Pragati Maidan from 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm.

The session will also have insights into providing top tips on how to successfully contract rights. Also, David Taylor, SVP, Ingram Content Group, will be speaking at this event to demystify the global distribution strategy for local publishers.