CHENNAI: The 49th Chennai Book Fair, organised by the Booksellers’ and Publishers’ Association of South India, will be held from January 8 to January 21 at the YMCA grounds in Nandanam. The event will be inaugurated by Chief Minister M.K. Stalin at 5.30 pm on January 8.
Addressing the media in Chennai, the organisers said that around 1,000 book stalls would be set up at this year’s fair. The venue will remain open to the public from 11 am to 8.30 pm every day. The fair will be conducted for 14 days, and a 10 per cent discount will be offered on all books across stalls.
"Discussions are under way on whether entry to the fair should be made free this year. Entry will be free for school students, as in previous years," Nakkhreeran Gopal, Vice President of BAPASI said.
Separate stalls will be set up for the Tamil Nadu Textbook and Educational Services Corporation, Sahitya Akademi, National Book Trust, Publications Division, Thanjavur Tamil University and the Department of Archaeology. A stall for the Illam Thedi Kalvi programme will also be introduced this year.
International and national publishing houses such as Penguin Random House India, British Council, HarperCollins Publishers India and Simon and Schuster India will participate in the fair. Stalls have been allotted to Tamil publishers from Malaysia and Singapore, while Tamil booksellers from Sri Lanka and Europe will also take part. A special stall has been provided for a queer publishing house run by transgender persons.
Every evening, lectures by noted scholars and writers from Tamil Nadu will be held at the venue. Competitions such as speech, storytelling and story writing, with a focus on the Tamil language, will be organised for school students.
At the inaugural function, the Chief Minister will present the Muthamizharingar Kalaignar M. Karunanidhi Porkizhi Awards for 2026 to selected writers and publishers. The awardees include Sukumaran for poetry, Adhavan Deetchanya for short stories, R. Murugan for novels, Bharathiputhran for prose, Karuna Prasad for drama and V. Geetha for translation.
Last year, the book fair was held for 17 days from December. According to the organisers, around 20 lakh people visited the fair and books worth about Rs 20 crore were sold.