Indore fall short of public libraries

“We are not giving enough encouragement to youngsters to be good readers”

Indore: The musty smell of books and the pin drop silence that captivates a library use to be the second home of every third person but with the increase of intense competition in every field, the public library has lost its charm completely.Over the years, Indore has seen launching of numerous technical and management institutes and becoming the education hub of Central India. But the number of public libraries has restricted to just four.

Libraries are supposed to satisfy the yearning of scholars by offering them quality books. But, it seems advent of internet, lack of interest among other factors have impeded their growth.Dr GHS Naidu, incharge of Central Library Khadwa road, said, “We are visited by 1 lakh students every year but all of them come to study books of their curriculum. It is very rare that I find students coming to the library and reading a book that is not related to their course or competition.”

Apart from the Central Library located in Takshilla campus, there are Nehru Library, Hindi Sahitya Samiti and Ahilya Library which fall under the category of public libraries and serving to the ardent readers of the city over decades now.But, people associated with these libraries find a very dull response from youths as Rakesh Sharma, Pustkalye Mantri of Hindi Sahitya Samithi said, “Only a very modest number of people visit public libraries and are interested in reading classic literature. Whatever the handful of people comes are inclined towards the course related books or demands those books which help them completing their PhD or any other course,” he said.

Sharma also added to the issue by saying that the reason of lack of interest among people is because of the fact that Indore lacks public libraries and the youngsters are not giving enough encouragement for becoming readers.Sandeep Patodi, incharge of Nehru Library also shared the same experience saying, “The young crowd that come in to our library is only interested in reading books on current affairs, magazines and newspaper hardly I witness any youngster coming in search of any book that is beyond their course.”Although, there are private book stores like Crosswords, Readers Paradise that are doing a good business for themselves in terms of selling books but the city is indeed lacking public libraries.