The National Youth Festival (NYF), organized annually since 1995 to commemorate the birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda on 12th January, serves as a flagship platform to unite youth from diverse cultural and social backgrounds, fostering national integration and empowerment. In the year 2025, the festival was restructured as the Viksit Bharat Young Leaders Dialogue (VBYLD) in alignment with the Hon’ble Prime Minister’s vision of Viksit Bharat @2047.

Building on this success, the 29th NYF-VBYLD-2026 will be organised by the Ministry with the objective of engaging the youth aged between 15 to 29 years.

Competitions will be held under the following 4 tracks for selection of contingents of States and UTs for participation in the NYF-VBYLD-2026 to be held in January,2026 in New Delhi:

1. Cultural and Innovation Track
2. Viksit Bharat Challenge Track
3. Design for Bharat
4. Hack for social cause

The District-level activities will commence on 1st September, 2025 with competitions under the Cultural and Innovation tracks, continuing through State-level competitions in November and December, 2025 and culminating in the National Youth Festival in January 2026 in New Delhi.

Target Group and Eligibility for participation VBYLD-2026
Youth in the age group of 15-29 years (as on 1st September, 2025) would be eligible for participation in various tracks of VBYLD-2026.

The details of various tracks of VBYLD-2026 are as follows:

The details of ‘Design for Bharat’ and ‘Hack for social cause’ tracks and timelines will be announced separately.