Bangla Academy has decided to hold this year’s Amar Ekushey Book Fair in December for the first time, breaking the tradition of holding it every February to commemorate Language Martyrs’ Day.

The decision was taken at a meeting held on Thursday afternoon at the office of Munir Chowdhury, a senior official of the Academy, to finalize the dates for Amar Ekushey Book Fair 2026.

In a press release signed by Bangla Academy Director General Mohammad Azam, it was stated that due to the upcoming national parliamentary elections and the holy month of Ramadan, the fair will begin on December 17, 2025, and continue until January 17, 2026.

The meeting was chaired by Mofidur Rahman, Secretary of the Ministry of Cultural Affairs, and attended by senior officials of the Academy as well as representatives from the Publishers and Book-sellers Association.

According to the officials, Ramadan is expected to begin in the third week of February depending on moon sighting. The caretaker government is preparing to conduct the 13th national parliamentary elections before that. Keeping these two factors in mind, the dates for the Amar Ekushey Book Fair were finalized on Thursday.

History of Amar Ekushey Book Fair

The book fair was first disrupted in 1983 during the anti-autocracy movement under Hussain Muhammad Ershad, but otherwise, it has been held annually. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the fair’s schedule was shifted to March in 2021, 2022, and 2023.

The origins of the fair trace back to February 21, 1972, when Chittaranjan Saha, founder of the publishing house Muktadhara, sold books on the pavement outside Bangla Academy during Language Movement Day events.

In 1974, Muktadhara set up a small stall inside the Academy in line with the February 21 programs. By 1977, other publishers joined, marking the beginning of the Ekushey Book Fair.

In 1978, the then Director General of Bangla Academy, Ashraf Siddiqui, officially associated the Academy with the fair. A year later, the Bangladesh Book Sellers and Publishers Association joined the event.

During Monzure Mowla’s tenure as Director General in 1983, preparations were made for an “Amar Ekushey Granthamela,” but it could not be held. From 1984, the Academy began organizing the Amar Ekushey Granthamela regularly under clear guidelines. From 2021, the fair has been officially named the Amar Ekushey Book Fair.

The fair has traditionally been held on the Bangla Academy premises, but as space became limited, stalls were gradually extended to the front road. In 2014, stalls were also allocated at Shahbagh’s Suhrawardy Udyan for creative publishing houses and various public and private organizations, while the main stage and information center remained at Bangla Academy.

Over the past decade, the book fair has been jointly held at Bangla Academy and Suhrawardy Udyan.