It was founded in 2007 by Founder Festival Director Prathibha Prahlad.
The experts who supported the idea of an International Arts Festival in Delhi were late Ram Nivas Mirdha of Sangeet Natak Akademi, Sri Pavan Varma of ICCR, Sri Parvez Dewan of ITDC and others.
Aruna Vasudev, Shanta Serbjeetsingh SINGH, SK Aggrawal, Kusum Sahni & Prathibha Prahlad are the trustees.
DIAF has presented over 100,000 artists from all over the world in the last 11 years.
In 2015 the festival was held at the Purana Quila and directed by Prathibha Prahlad.