New Delhi, July 27 (Inditop.com) Nita Sinha, 79, is a voracious reader but was afraid that her two grandchildren would forget books in their craze for computers. She came across a community library near her home and is now able to share her passion for books with them.
“We earlier used to think that children would soon be lost in the world of computers and leave reading behind. But now I see my grandchildren, along with their friends, going to the community library and feel reassured that the interest is still there,” said Sinha, a resident of Sector 14 in Noida and member of the local community library.
Like her, others too are becoming members of community libraries surfacing in many residential neighbourhoods like south Delhi’s Vasant Kunj, R.K. Puram and the Noida suburbs.
While most of these libraries charge no membership fees, some like the Sector 15 library in Noida charge an annual maintenance fee of Rs.250 plus a one time security deposit of Rs.550.
Ranjana Bhatnagar, former director of the American Information Resource Center, feels that though still few in number, these libraries can provide the required encouragement to children as well as adults to inculcate the reading habit.
Bhatnagar told Inditop: “There aren’t too many of these libraries around but they definitely help encourage reading habits. I feel that these libraries are of great help as unlike the public libraries their timings are convenient — open for students when they are done with school, accessible to housewives as well as the nine to five office-goers.”
The library users also feel that since the library belongs to the community, members have a say in what books are chosen.
Sakshi Shrivastava, 16, a member of the Sector 15 Noida community library, said: “I like the library because, unlike the school library, it has a larger variety of books and novels for teenagers.”
Noida’s Sector 14 library even has a collection of rare books contributed by members like Rudyard Kipling’s “Verses” (first edition, 1898), Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass”, M.M. Kaye’s “The Golden Calm”.
Another member of the same library is Ankita Pal, 35, a housewife, who was worried that her 11-year-old son shied away from books. So she was pleasantly surprised when her son proposed that they join the library.
“At first I was surprised to hear that my son Surjeet wanted to join the library. Later I found that even his friends had joined – so it was a group activity too,” Pal said.
While most of community libraries are funded by residents there are some that began on individual initiative like the Buty Public Library in Sector B-11, Vasant Kunj, that is scientist Vimla Buty’s baby.
Started in 2004, the library has 4,500 books in English and Hindi as well as magazines and journals.
Buty told IANS: “In the absence of any public library in Vasant Kunj, the need for establishing one was eminent. Even though the library is mostly for the elderly of Vasant Kunj, we welcome everyone.”
W.M. Bali, a retired government official who is a regular visitor, said: “I like the library very much – it has all kinds of books ranging from religious, fiction and non-fiction. The library also subscribes to my favourite magazines.”
In addition to residential communities, even vernacular community libraries have gained popularity in the capital.
“The libraries run by the different Kali Baris (temples) and Bengali associations provide Bangla books and literature,” said Shiuli Mukherjee, 35.
She added: “As a parent I fear that regional literature and our traditions are getting lost, that is why I encourage my children to come to the library.”
Another library that caters to vernacular tastes is the Vanita Samaj Library for Marathi books that houses around 45,000 books.
The number of members of the Theerar Satyamurthy Memorial Library Tamil Sangam, which has 18,000 Tamil books, and the Karnataka Sangam Library, with a whopping 60,000 books, have also risen in the past decade.
Shameemunnisa, the librarian at the Tamil Sangam library, said: “The condition of the library has improved and the number of members has now increased to at least 3,226.”
Membership fees at the regional libraries is nominal – enrolment costs Rs.500 while annual fee is Rs.100.
