Bibliography Database

The Mandate

To become a clearing house for all translation related activities in India.
Special thanks to Pro. G.N. Devy, Bhasha Sanshodhan Kendra, Vadodara for his contribution of data and inputs to the design of the database.

Why a Bibliography?

Bibliography is a systematic study and description of books. It is a list of titles that share a common factor which may be a topic, a language or a period or so. This list may be comprehensive or selective in nature.

The purpose of the bibliography is to organize information about the material on a given subject so that knowledge seekers of the subject may have easy access to it. The information is related to a book or a product of those activities. So, in a way bibliography is something that tells us the history of the book.

Click here to know more about the development of the Bibliography of Translation Database.
  SOURCES :
  » Anukruti (CIIL – Sahitya Akademi & NBT)
  » Bhasha Sanshodhan Kendra, Vadodara
  » British Library’s Oriental and India Office Collections
  » Catalogues of various publishers
  » Central Reference Library, Kolkata
  » National Bibliography of India Literature (NBIL)
  » South Asian Union Catalogue, (University of Chicago Library’s Southern Asia Dept.)
  » UNESCO
  » University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign NTM is, at present, collecting information form more sources and will digitize them to be added to the database soon.

Styles of Bibliography

Regarding the styles of a Bibliography, different sources have different kinds of formats in a Bibliography.

Two of the most commonly used guidelines for this format are The MLA (Modern Language Association) and the APA (American Psychological Association) formats. The Modern Language Association style is found to be used widely for citing research sources or making bibliography on various topics. National Translation Mission is also following this style, with a unique numerical identification system added to it.

Unique features of the Bibliography developed by NTM

This bibliography developed by NTM focuses on translated titles belonging both to literary and non-literary genres. Moreover, it tries to explore the translated titles published in all the languages in India irrespective of whether they are listed in the VIII schedule of the constitution or not.

The process of incorporating information of translated titles from languages other than Indian languages and vice versa is also part of the agenda.

NTM proposes a unique identification number through this bibliography, which will be known as ISTN (Indian Standard Translation Number) for the books translated into Indian languages. The reason for creating ISTN is to keep track of the translated titles which are published in various Indian Languages. This will obviously help researchers/scholars/knowledge seekers to get an idea of the number of books published in a given language, in a particular discipline, in a particular year etc.


NTM decides to keep this database as web-based to facilitate greater accessibility. It will also provide opportunities to improve the database with new information.

If you have information on any translation that is not in the database already,you are invited to add the information and help NTM. You can create and an user account and create records about the translations in your knowledge. You can also send the information to ntmciil@gmail.com which will be updated in the database by NTM. If you are a publisher, the facility for user input can be used by you to update information about your latest translations directly in the database. You can also send the information to ntmciil@gmail.com which will be updated in the database by NTM.

Bibliography Search

Search here for information on any translation titles in Indian languages.