Can a country sell its future without forgetting its past? The 45th India International Trade Fair, inaugurated at Bharat Mandapam on the evening of 13 November, tries to answer. Its theme, “Vikas aur Virasat” (development and heritage), holds that India’s economic rise and cultural inheritance are one story, not two. Organised by the India Trade Promotion Organisation (ITPO), the fair opens for business on 14 November, running to 27 November across 17 halls, with around 3,500 exhibitors.
This year’s India International Trade Fair (IITF) has a theme that doubles as a thesis. Vikas aur Virasat, development and heritage, frames the 45th edition, running from 14 to 27 November at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi. The first five days, 14 to 18 November, belong to trade visitors: exporters, wholesalers and foreign buyers who prefer to close deals away from the crowds. From 19 November, the public is admitted, and the fair becomes the winter outing Delhi has known for over four decades. More than 3,500 exhibitors are expected, from ministries and PSUs to MSMEs, start-ups, artisans and foreign participants. Bihar, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh are the Partner States; Assam, Delhi, Jharkhand and West Bengal share the Focus State spotlight, up from a single Focus State in recent years. Read the tentative hall plan and you have a sketch of India’s economy.
Hall 1 hosts the foreign pavilions; Halls 2 to 5 go to the Partner and Focus States, central ministries and PSUs, with state and Union Territory pavilions upstairs. Hall 11 showcases electronics, consumer durables, footwear and textiles; Halls 12 and 12A cover processed food, spices, agri-produce, handicrafts and start-ups.
Rajasthan’s pavilion distils the theme into a journey “from heritage to development”: folk art at one end, investment policy at the other. Heritage also takes the stage. Bharat Utsav brings 18 state-day celebrations, 18 key performances and 51 other shows across seven venues, from Hariharan and Salim-Sulaiman to Sufi, Carnatic and Odissi. ITPO promises more entertainment, family recreation and dining, and the food courts will again compress the subcontinent’s cuisines into a short walk. The fair runs from 10 am to 7:30 pm, with public entry until 5:30 pm; tickets are sold online and at Metro stations, and an official app carries updates.
Beyond the spectacle, why does a physical fair still matter in the e-commerce age? For a weaver from Bhagalpur, a lacquerware maker from Channapatna or a millet entrepreneur from Odisha, it offers what no online marketplace can: lakhs of buyers, instant feedback on price and design, and a chance of being found by an exporter in one conversation. For many, the fortnight can be a substantial share of the year’s sales. States use it to compete and court investment; the Centre turns Make in India and Viksit Bharat 2047 into things people can touch and buy. As supply chains are redrawn, India pitches scale and craft together. The fair has changed with the country it mirrors. First held in 1980 at Pragati Maidan, it was a rare window on foreign goods in an economy of scarcity, and for a generation it meant Raj Rewal’s Hall of Nations. In 2017, the Hall of Nations and much of the old complex were demolished. Bharat Mandapam, inaugurated in 2023, gave the fair a modern home.
IITF: showcasing viksit bharat
IITF's recent themes ran from Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam to Viksit Bharat @2047 to Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat. After previous editions spent projecting the future, this year's fair insists the future be rooted.
The theme carries a quiet irony: virasat is celebrated on ground where a modernist landmark was razed for something newer. That tension may be the theme at its most honest: progress in India has always been a negotiation with inheritance, sometimes graceful, sometimes not.
The fortnight will be judged less by speeches than by results: export orders signed, artisans who find buyers, and families who carry home a wider sense of belonging to the country.