Addressing a press conference here on Wednesday, ITPO Chairperson and Managing Director Sheela Bhide said the Delhi Book Fair had emerged as an eagerly awaited event for book lovers. "Since 1995, the ITPO in collaboration with FIP has been organising the fair. It has been growing successfully each year. Compared with 224 participants last year, the upcoming fair has attracted 299 participants from India, the United States, China, Pakistan, Spain, the United Arab Emirates and Iran." Informing that the fair would be taken from Delhi to other cities, the ITPO Chairman said it would be known as "India Book Fair" when it is held in Mumbai next year. "At the exhibition we will showcase management books. After this there would be an `India Book Fair' in Chennai in which books on engineering and other technical subjects would be displayed."

Describing India as a great book producing country, Ms. Bhide said it has a vibrant book publishing industry. "The international character of the event in Delhi has been progressively reinforced by the growing presence of overseas participants and this serves as an automatic attestation of the potential of the Indian publishing industry."

Pointing out that the fair offers a vast scope for short-term business transactions, Ms. Bhide said it also acts as a platform for co-publishing agreements, translation copyrights and reprinting arrangements.