New Delhi: On a hot Thursday afternoon, more than 30 students sat quietly in the study room at Delhi Public Library. The pages of their books and newspapers rustled under the whirring of the fans beating the heavy humid air. It was a shared space where no one is turned away. But libraries are a dying space, and the Ministry of Culture wants to change that. In an attempt to resuscitate reading rooms, the government is holding a two-day Festival of Libraries.
On 5-6 August, librarians, authors, publishers, and district collectors will gather at Delhi’s Pragati Maidan with the goal of making libraries cool again among a generation hooked on reels and selfies.
Discussions will range from architectural accessibility and linguistic inclusivity to digital innovations, translations, archival of manuscripts and rare books.
“The entire ecosystem of libraries can graduate from bare reading rooms to cultural hotspots,” said Mugdha Sinha, joint-secretary of the Ministry of Culture at a press conference on Wednesday.
Through the festival, the government wants to explore how libraries can informally support exchange of ideas. They can mimic gardens or community drawing rooms.
“We can consider (the festival) as a communion of physical and digital library,” said Arjun Ram Meghwal, Union Minister of State for Law & Justice, Parliamentary Affairs and Culture. “The need for libraries will not decline in the coming days.”
A library movement is on
Libraries are increasingly being reduced to spaces for students preparing for exams, which limits the diversity in readership, reflected in the range of books available. Regional literature is non-existent, while textbooks and study material are in high demand.
The privately run Bibliotheca at Indraprastha Extension was almost vacant on Wednesday morning. Chairs were closely lined along the wooden desks on the second floor, in addition to an outdoor space for readers. While carrying your own laptop is handy, a printer and a computer are available.
“We don’t have the facility of books anymore because most students here prepare for competitive exams,” says Pankaj, the owner of the Bibliotheca library.
But every now and then, there are reports of industrialists, activists, volunteers, teachers, and government officials trying to revive the reading habit. In Mumbai, the David Sassoon Library and Reading Room at Kala Ghoda was painstakingly restored at a cost of Rs 3.6 crore. In Delhi, the Community Library Project, which holds BR Ambedkar as its inspiration, is making books and stories accessible to everyone. Caste, class, and ability inclusion are the focus. In Karnataka, the state government has upgraded 5,600 gram panchayat libraries, of which around 4,000 have computers and internet connectivity, and over three million children have been enrolled free of charge. And in Bihar, libraries have been set up in every village of Purnia, the state’s least literate district.
“Under Jeevika program, we organised a webinar with IITians addressing over 7000+ students in Bihar”, IAS Rahul Kumar told ThePrint. Rahul Kumar, who has served as Purnea District Magistrate, has spearheaded setting up of public libraries across 230 gram panchayats of the Bihar district.
“One of the big reasons libraries today merely attract competitive exam aspirants is the traditional notion of education for employment”, he added.
These success stories are a reflection of the government’s commitment to bring in a culture of reading in India.
“With the advent of social media, reading habit is declining. Children in rural areas are prone to drug addiction if they are not given the right direction at the right time,” IAS Himanshu Kafaltia told TheBetterIndia. Himanshu has helped set up more than 15 libraries in Uttarakhand’s villages.
In her budget speech this year, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman proposed a national digital library for children and adolescents, and strengthening the National Book Trust.
Beyond linguistic inclusion
But the government has its work cut out. On an average, there is one public library for over 30,000 people in the country, but the disparity between states is stark. Kerala (8,415 libraries), Tamil Nadu (4,622), and West Bengal (5,251) are ahead of the reading curve compared with Madhya Pradesh (42), Rajasthan (323), and Uttar Pradesh (573).
“The washroom facility at the Delhi library is abysmal and causes trouble to senior citizens like me,” says YP Sharma, an old reader.
Only 16% of public libraries across India have auditoriums or meeting rooms for community sessions such as storytelling events, according to the 2018 public library survey by Raja Rammohun Roy Library Foundation, Kolkata.
Although India hosts more than 238 literary festivals, most of these are organised in affluent hotel spaces, said Sinha, who wants to “bring back these literary festivals to libraries”.
There are calls for more regional literature, digital archives and spaces for senior citizens as well. “We don’t have books in northeastern and southern languages but we do have Punjabi books,” Dyal Singh’s librarian told ThePrint.
Even though linguistic inclusion is one of the focuses of the festival, most of the panelists invited, including Gunjan Goela, Dikshu Kukreja and Pushpesh Pant, hail predominantly from the north region. “The manch isn’t large enough to accommodate all,” said Sinha during her presentation.
Meghwal, the culture minister, proposed at the conference that libraries should have corners for physically disabled, senior citizens and children to encourage reading across family generations. Mobility became a catchphrase at the conference, with recommendation for setting-up more mobile libraries at all levels, particularly in villages.
A set of cursive writing books in 22 regional languages along with the Sassy Library series will be released during the event.
To drum up buzz around the festival, influencers such as Global Chalchitra have been invited to participate in the discussions. From open mics to drawing room discussion around culinary literature, the event is deploying various methods to make libraries a catchword.
The event will also see the release along with a set of cursive writing books in 22 regional languages.
The librarian at the Dyal Singh Library responded to the question of participation with a similar indifference, saying that the library is aware though not explicitly invited, it will try to participate in the event.
(Edited by Prashant)