The Asian Prizes are five separate prizes that aim at four major categories of literary work: fiction, short story, poetry, and translation, and the flagship prize is given to a person whose outstanding contribution to global literature. While the guardianship of the prizes is held by The Asian Group of Literature, the sponsorship for each prize, except The Asian Prize for Literature, may change from one edition to the other. 

The Asian Prizes are offered after a multi-tiered evaluation of work submitted by the publishers. The prize evaluators for each edition and the prize represent the diversity of today’s global literary landscape, coming from different parts of the world.

The Asian Prizes are adminstered differently from the usual prize managment process.

The Asian has a ‘No Judges Poicy’. We believe that no one but the readers can evaluate the books, no one can judge a piece of art, and, the writers don’t write books for writers so we do not have ‘Judges’ of common-kind.

Unlike most of the other prizes, The Asian Group follows a confidential selection mechanism and does not declare evaluators till the day of the award ceremony.

The Asian Prize for fiction is not publicly funded, therefore, The Asian Group of Literature has the absolute authority on the process, and the decisions for them to remain void of external influences.

The Asian Group of Literature has the absolute authority to chose the evaluators based in its own assessment. .

Lobbying of any sort is considred disqualification.

The Asian Prize for Literature 

The Asian Prize for Literature is awarded every fifth year to the person who has done the best in the field of literature in his or her 25 years of literary career, irrespective of published language or native or citizen status. The Prize is not open for external submissions. 

The Asian Prize for Fiction

The Asian Prize for Fiction is an annual prize hosted by a sponsoring country each year and will be open for work across all genres of fiction. The prize is open to authors from all continents, and submission is required by the publishers. Self-published books are not entitled to the prize. 

Except for the first edition (APF23), the prize is open for submissions by the publishers. The submissions will be open from 11th November to 21st December every year, each year. The work was published between 12th November (the previous year) and 11th December of the year for the Prize. 

Download below the submission form and Submission guidelines :(Submission Closed for 2023)

The Asian Prize for Translations 

The Asian Prize for Translation is an annual prize hosted in Sri Lanka and is limited to translations into local languages (Sinhala and Tamil) directly from the language of the original text, except English. The designated city of the prize is Gampaha, formally known as Henrathgoda, the native place for several literary personalities of Sri Lanka, such as Mahagama Sekera, Henry Jayasena, Jayalal Rohana.

The submissions will be open from 11th December to 21st December every year, each year. The work should be published between 12th December (the previous year) and 11th December of the year for the Prize. 

The main sponsor for the prize is Minsara Publishers and Bookshop. 

Download below the submission form and Submission guidelines : (Submission closed for 2023)