The NDTV World Summit 2026 is set to return to New Delhi on October 22 and 23, bringing together leaders and influential voices from politics, geopolitics, business, economics, technology and culture to examine a world undergoing a period of major transition. This year’s edition will be held under the theme ‘A World Between Orders’, focusing on the changing global landscape and the questions emerging between established structures and new centres of influence.

 According to a press release, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will headline the Summit, as he did in the previous two editions, setting the context for discussions around the changing global order. The Summit will bring together policymakers, economists, business leaders, thinkers, innovators and cultural voices to examine the forces reshaping geopolitics, global economics, technology and India’s position in the world.

Among the speakers announced for the 2026 edition are Dr Swarnim Wagle, Federal Minister of Finance of Nepal; Sanjay Malhotra, Governor, Reserve Bank of India; Swami Sarvapriyananda, Minister and Spiritual Leader, Vedanta Society of New York; Nikhil Kamath, Founder, Zerodha; and Mike Walsh, Futurist and AI Specialist. Their sessions are expected to cover areas ranging from global strategy and monetary policy to artificial intelligence, the future of work, spirituality and the relationship between technology and humanity.

The theme, ‘A World Between Orders’, reflects a period in which established global structures continue to influence international affairs while new centres of economic, technological and geopolitical influence are emerging. NDTV describes the current phase as one in which old certainties are weakening, alliances are shifting and economic integration is being redefined, while the contours of a new global order remain unsettled.

This transition raises questions that extend beyond traditional geopolitics. Strategic autonomy, for instance, is increasingly being discussed against the backdrop of global interdependence, while artificial intelligence and data have become closely linked to questions of technology, governance and national power. Similarly, debates around multilateralism and the Global South are increasingly connected to the question of whether existing international institutions adequately represent a changing distribution of economic and political influence.

India will be an important part of these conversations. With its growing economic and technological ambitions and expanding role in global diplomacy, the country is increasingly involved in discussions around the future of international cooperation and emerging global alignments. The Summit’s official description places India’s growing role at the centre of the broader conversation about what comes next.

The 2026 edition follows the NDTV World Summit held in New Delhi in October 2025, which brought together Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Sri Lankan Prime Minister Harini Amarasuriya, former UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, alongside experts and leaders from business, technology, climate and culture. NDTV’s annual report described the gathering as a forum for discussions spanning geopolitics, economic resilience and the evolving architecture of international cooperation.

The upcoming Summit is being positioned as a wider conversation on the forces shaping the next phase of global affairs, bringing politics and diplomacy into dialogue with economics, technology, enterprise and society. The official Summit platform says the objective is to examine the present transition while exploring the possibilities emerging from it.

With ‘A World Between Orders’ as its central theme, the NDTV World Summit 2026 will bring these questions together in New Delhi on October 22 and 23, creating a forum for discussions on a global system in transition and India’s role within it.