New Delhi: Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan today inaugurated the New Delhi World Book Fair 2026 in the august presence of Qatar’s Culture Minister HE Abdulrahman Bin Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Al Thani, Spain’s Culture Minister HE Ernest Urtasun Domènech, and other distinguished guests. The world’s largest B2C book fair is a grand celebration of India’s strong reading culture with a confluence of ideas.
The theme of the book fair—“Indian Military History: Courage and Wisdom @ 75”—and the participation of countries like Qatar and Spain give this cultural and literary event international significance.
On this occasion, the translation of the book “Kudopali Ki Gatha: The Unsung Story of 1857,” based on the unheard chapters of the freedom struggle and the conflict that took place on the soil of Sambalpur, was released.
The book was released in nine Indian languages, including Bengali, Assamese, Punjabi, Marathi, Malayalam, Urdu, and one international language (Spanish). Previously, the book had been published in Hindi, English, and Odia. Now, the book is available in a total of 13 languages. This initiative honors the memory of Veer Surendra Sai ji and the martyrs of Kudopali, while strengthening India’s multilingual and global dialogue tradition.
This event is an important step towards transforming the culture of reading into a mass movement by Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri @narendramodi. The Prime Minister’s vision of a ‘developed India’ is not limited to infrastructure or technology, but is based on the creation of an aware, thoughtful, and reading generation.