Redefining libraries
in digital world
Inculcating reading habits and making
libraries a vibrant place is the prime focus of the Delhi government. As part
of the initiative, it is involving school teachers, librarians and the state
government authorities.
“We aim at breaking the misconception that a library is not a place for those who cannot read,” said Swaha Sahoo, head, Parag Initiative, Tata Trusts on the sidelines of Children’s Library Unconference held recently.
Parag, an initiative of Tata Trusts began supporting the publishing of literature in Indian languages in 2005. “We worked with non-profit publishers and sponsored the production of books. In the last 10 years, we have supported more than 700 original books in 7-8 regional languages,” said Sahoo.
Merely publishing books was not enough, it was important for children to have access to these. “We started working with organisations to promote children’s libraries that offered books in multiple formats including audio, braille, animated, ebooks etc. We developed a three-pronged model of sourcing, publishing and disseminating children’s literature,” added Sahoo while speaking to Education Times.
“Untill these libraries were set up in our village, I had not seen so many books. My son can now read the sentences as he is exposed to reading story books. Before this, he was reluctant to pick up a book but library books have stories and attractive pictures,” said Gaytri Devi, mother of Shalini, a student of grade 5 in Sevadi village, Rajasthan.
In order to train the educators and librarians, the trust also launched a seven months Library Educator’s Course (LEC). “Now I have more knowledge of good literature, selection of books and making a rich library,” said Chitra Singh, a government primary school teacher in Delhi who started her own library after completing the course.
Parag has enabled 1000 libraries to involve as many as 40 million readers. The trust is also planning to engage the students on its digital library, Kitablet.
Source
| Times of India | 8th July 2019
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Mr.
Pralhad Jadhav
Master
of Library & Information Science (NET Qualified)
Research
Scholar (IGNOU)
Senior
Manager @ Knowledge Repository
Khaitan
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