Overwhelming Response to VoW Book Awards 2026!

Dr Tania Saili Bakshi

Dateline Dehradun: Seventy odd publishers. Six hundred books. Keeping its date with tradition, the Valley of Words Literature Festival received an overwhelming response in nominations for its VoW Book Awards 2026 which were closed mid-night of 28^th February.

Celebrating ts 10^th edition Dasham this year, Valley of Words (VoW)| Shabdavali is a one-of-a-kind, not-for-profit and volunteer-driven initiative of The Valley of Words Foundation Trust, which has now become a pan-Indian celebration of Indian writing, culture, and artistry. Over the course of a decade, VoW has continued to celebrate the brilliance of authors across genres and languages — almost every book which has been reviewed and discussed in the past calendar year finds its place in the 2026 nominations, validating the prolific nature of the current publishing scene in India.

The VoW Book Awards aka the VBA are given to eight authors under the following categories: English Fiction, English Non-Fiction, Hindi Fiction, Hindi Non-fiction, Translation from Indian languages into Hindi, Translation from Indian languages into English, Writings for Young Adults (bilingual) and Picture/Childrens Books (bilingual).

The Longlist of 10 books in each category will be dispatched to an esteemed Jury (last year winners in the eight categories) who then have the uphill task of selecting the five shortlisted books by mid-June. VoW will announce the Shortlist during the National Reading Month which starts on June 19th in honour of   PN Panicker, the father of the Library and Literacy Movement in Kerala. The final winner under each of the eight categories will be felicitated at the Signature VoW Event to be held in Dehradun on the 28^th and 29^th of November 2026. 

Talking about this year’s nominations, Festival Director Dr Sanjeev Chopra said, “The real strength of the VoW Book Awards is not just in the  growing  numbers of books, but their diversity from self-published writers in cantonment towns to established authors represented by global publishing companies. The real challenge begins now as the Secretariat invites internal feedback in longlisting books for the consideration of the Jury. They will have an even tougher time — critical reading of the selected titles is both a challenge and a joy!”