Pratham Books

Pratham Books is a not-for-profit children's book publisher set up in 2004 to publish good quality, affordable books in many Indian languages. The organisation's mission is to see "a book in every child's hand" and democratize the joy of reading among all children. Pushing boundaries in children's publishing, Pratham Books combines physical book distribution with open-access digital innovation to reach millions of children across underserved communities.

Headquarters: Bengaluru, Karnataka (with additional office in Noida, Uttar Pradesh)

Major Areas of Work

• Multilingual Print & Digital Publishing: Creating affordable, high-quality picture books across multiple reading levels and diverse Indian languages to make storybooks accessible to all children.
• Open Access & EdTech Innovation: Operating StoryWeaver, a digital platform that hosts open-licensed (CC0) content, enabling stories to be read, translated, versioned, or downloaded for free.
• Foundational & STEM Literacy: Designing structured educational interventions, including Foundational Literacy Programmes (FLP) and STEM Literacy Programmes for early primary grades.
• Capacity Building & Community Outreach: Partnering with state education departments, tribal development departments, and ground NGOs to train teachers and supervisors on library usage and mother-tongue reading.

Major Initiatives & Programmes

• StoryWeaver: A global open-source digital platform providing access to thousands of multilingual storybooks that can be customized, translated, and downloaded for offline or print use.
• Foundational Literacy Programme (FLP) & Reading Programme (RP): Level-based multilingual reading packages designed for early grade readers (Grades 1 to 3) in languages like Hindi and Marathi.
• STEM Literacy Programme & Regional Interventions: Comprehensive STEM-focused storybook interventions across primary grades, alongside targeted projects such as mother-tongue reading in tribal centers in Rajasthan.

Impact

Pratham Books has transformed the early literacy reader ecosystem by expanding its repository to over 34,000 storybooks in 296 languages on StoryWeaver. Recognized globally for its innovative model, Pratham Books has received accolades including the Library of Congress Literacy Award International Prize and holds a GuideStar India Platinum badge.

Leadership

Chairperson & Managing Trustee – R. Sriram

Trustee – Suzanne Singh

Co-Founder & Trustee – Ashok Kamath

Co-Founder – Rohini Nilekani

Pratham Books is an excellent fit for professionals passionate about open education, multilingual publishing, EdTech, early childhood literacy, and social impact strategy who want to help democratize access to joyful reading for children.