Srinagar Public Library- A small attempt that fills the void

Ajay Ramola

Tribune News Service

Mussoorie, August 22

Srinagar, once the capital of Garhwal, is a bustling cultural-educational town with Central Garhwal University situated here today.

A melange of highly qualified teachers and motivated students has led to creation of Srinagar Public Library in quiet bylanes of Srinagar, much to the delight of everyone.

Srinagar Public Library boasts of a collection of around 1,000 books that are displayed in a small room rented for the purpose of motivating the young minds by some teachers and students who met over a cup of tea last year.

The books, right from comics for young minds, to some serious philosophy by Sigmund Freud, Mahatma Gandhi, Marxian philosophy, Vedic Arithmetic adorn its limited shelves.

In the past one year, the small room full of books collected with the help of teachers and students has become a major hub for gaining knowledge and also exchanging diverse thought with each other.

The students, Reshma Panwar, Manisha Semwal, Kusum Pandey, Prakash, Minakshi Negi and many others, operate this library daily after their studies.

Volunteers from the All-India Democratic Students Organisation also make ample contribution in running this library which is a non-commercial venture.

The speciality of the library is the lively discussions on various issues that rock the nation and in particular Uttarakhand.

Several teachers from Garhwal University also attend the lively discussions that take place here from time to time.

The discussions held on Saturday on the topic “Migration and Uttarakhand” was well-attended and a great hit among the students, says Mukesh Semwal, state president of the Social Unity Centre of India (SUCI) who is the brain behind the concept of students running their own library in the city.

Kusum Pandey, third year BSc student, says, “The discussion in library helps us to understand various issues related to Uttarakhand.”

To run the library efficiently, a committee comprising Prof RC Dimri (Maths dept), Prof SS Rawat (Education dept) Dr SS Bisht (History dept), Prof Surekha Dangwal (English dept), Suresh Bhatt, Dr Mukesh Semwal has been formed to provide guidance to students.

Prof Dimri says, “This library runs on a rented place and we are appealing to some organisation to help us shifting to some permanent structure”.

Prof Surekha Dangwal says, “A modern library was needed in this town and this void was filled by this small attempt and she hopes that the readers’ movement will grow big.”

Dr Bisht says, “We are thankful to Minakshiben Joshi of the Cultural Education (Gujarat) Forum and Colonel Dimri for donations of books to the library.

Mukesh Semwal views that the library is never a leftist, rightist or centrist in its ideology. It is a centre of propagating logic and reason among the students. He says they are not keen on any government help but will love people to donate rare books that could be of help to the students.