New Delhi, August 29, 2026 (Yes Punjab News)
A political controversy has erupted over Penguin Random House India’s decision not to publish Congress Parliamentary Party Chairperson Sonia Gandhi’s memoir Belonging: A Journey of Love, with the BJP rejecting allegations of government interference and a Congress MP alleging that the publisher may have faced pressure from the Centre.
Reacting to the issue in Jaipur, Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat said the disagreement appeared to be between the author and the publisher and should not be politicised.
“There is some kind of disagreement between the author and the publisher. The publisher has their own prerogative, and the author has their own viewpoint. Instead of bringing it into politics, they could have found another publisher. What is the need to bring the Government of India into this?” Shekhawat said.
Bihar Minister Ram Kripal Yadav similarly maintained that the government had no role in the matter.
“The government has nothing to do with it. If the publisher is not publishing it, then the matter concerns the Congress party, the people who wrote the biography and the publishing house. The government has no interference in it,” he said in Patna.
BJP leader T.R. Srinivas, speaking in Hyderabad, questioned the timing of the decision and alleged that the memoir contained references to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the RSS and China.
“The timing looks political, non-literary,” Srinivas said, while claiming that Penguin had objected on factual grounds.
BJP National Vice President M. Nagaraja, however, said it was too early to comment without having seen the book.
“Regarding Sonia Gandhi’s autobiography, Penguin has already said that they are not publishing it. We have not seen or read the book, so it is too early to comment on it,” he said.
Congress MP Akhilesh Prasad Singh alleged that the publisher could have faced pressure from the government.
“This is absolutely wrong. No publisher can put pressure on an author. An author has their own views and experiences, which they write about in their book. There must have been pressure from the government on the publisher through the backdoor,” he said.
Penguin Random House India announced on Friday that it would not publish Belonging: A Journey of Love. The publisher rejected suggestions that the decision was taken because Sonia Gandhi had declined editorial changes.
“Any suggestion that Penguin Random House India decided not to publish ‘Belonging’ because the author declined editorial changes does not accurately reflect the circumstances,” the publisher said.
It also defended its editorial process, stating that fact-checking and recommending changes in the interest of a book were part of a publisher’s responsibility.
The decision has since triggered a political exchange, with the BJP maintaining that the matter is an editorial dispute while Congress leaders have raised questions over the circumstances surrounding the publication decision.
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