Published : 29 Aug 2026, 12:18 AM
Updated : 08 Sep 2026, 09:36 AM
Publisher Penguin Random House India has denied it ever backed out of publishing "Belonging: A Journey of Love", the memoir of Congress leader Sonia Gandhi.
The denial came amid claims the publisher had withdrawn after Sonia refused editorial changes, NDTV reports.
"Penguin Random House India is not the publisher of Belonging in India. 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 company said, per the Indian outlet.
The publisher said it remained “keen to publish the book”, calling fact-checking and offering author recommendations a normal part of the process.
It declined to detail its discussions with Sonia. “We will not comment further on confidential discussions with the author.”
With Penguin out of contention, Indian publishers are now competing for the rights, with HarperCollins reported close to finalising a deal, NDTV said.
Alfred A Knopf, the US arm of Penguin Random House, has confirmed Sonia's memoir will be released on Nov 10.
"Much has been written about my family, but few narratives were able to reach into the truth of their motivations, their actions and even their very human failings," Sonia said in a Knopf statement.
"My story also offers readers a unique perspective of the social and political changes I have witnessed for six decades in the beautiful country of my belonging."
In the book, Sonia writes about her life being upended by the 1984 assassination of her mother-in-law, Indira Gandhi, and the 1991 murder of her husband, Rajiv Gandhi.
She went on to become the longest-serving president of the Congress party, turning down an offer to become prime minister. Her party lost power to Narendra Modi's BJP in 2014.
"It was heartbreak and loss that threw me into the public world of politics. Up till then I had guarded my privacy fiercely," she said.
“Writing about my life did not come easily to me.”
“Yet as I gradually removed myself from the political sphere, the thread of love and loyalty that wove through my story began to define itself, from the simplicity of my childhood in small-town Italy, to the complexity of my years in India as the wife of Rajiv Gandhi and the daughter-in-law of prime minister Indira Gandhi,” she added.
