Vyuh

Logistics

I visited the New Delhi World Book Fair 2026 on Saturday, 10 January 2026, the day it opened. To avoid the long queue near the exit of the Supreme Court Metro Station, I walked via Bhairon Marg to gate number 4. It was a long walk, but it spared me from waiting in a crowded queue. Along the way, I could see what appeared to be the walls of the Old Fort across the road. There was also an entrance to the Crafts Museum nearby, which I deliberately avoided, later I noted that it was accessible from within the Bharat Mandapam perimeter as well. I’ll perhaps visit it in the future. At the gate there was only security check and no ticket was required for entry. The exhibition was spread across halls 2 through 6. Halls 2 through 5 have independent foyers and entrances but are internally connected. I began at hall 5 and proceeded through halls 4, 3, and 2. In these halls, although the exhibitions were limited to the ground floor, the escalators were operating, apparently due to other events being held on the upper floors. After completing these connected halls, I ate a meal from food I had packed in a tiffin box accompanied with a cup of coffee from the food court. There was ample space to sit on the lawns and have a peaceful meal while viewing all the bustle near the exhibition halls. I then visited hall 6, which is a separate building. After finishing my visit, I reached the shuttle point, waited briefly in a queue, and took the free shuttle back to the gate near the metro station.

Observations

The newly constructed exhibition halls of Bharat Mandapam (earlier known as Pragati Maidan) are in use for a while now. They are well planned and spacious. They have sufficient number of well distributed gates, drinking water stalls, and clean restrooms. People were generally well behaved, though some tended to crowd around sculptures, informative banners, and displayed models for extended periods, making it difficult for others to get a clear view or take photographs.

I especially liked the illustrated books aimed at children, and found the stalls of the National Book Trust, Ekalavya Pitara, and Ektara Trust particularly worth exploring. I bought a few illustrated books from the National Book Trust stall.

Instituto Cervantes of Spain and Institut Français of France briefly inspired me to think again about language learning. So did the stalls featuring books in arabic, urdu, and classical tamil. Now a days, there is an increased focus on making multilingual content universally accessible, which is good.

In the foyers of halls 2 through 5, and in the theme pavilion, there were sculptures and models representing national defence symbols and technologies, often accompanied by defence personnel in uniform. I also spent time admiring the four military-use vehicles displayed in the open area at the front of the halls and found them particularly satisfying.

Government and publicly funded institutions had a strong and diverse presence, with the Ministry of Culture being especially thorough. It had sub-stalls for almost all its institutions, The Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, and the Ministry of Home Affairs had significant presence.

Among commercial publishers, Penguin Random House appeared to be exceptionally busy, while the stalls of HarperCollins India, Oxford University Press, and Cambridge University Press also stood out.

Parallel exhibitions such as Nakshatra and Arogyam were running at the same time, but I skipped them due to limited time and energy. I failed to spot the Children’s Book Trust stall and only noticed its name later in a photograph of the stall list, which I regret.