Visit any country which has shown tremendous progress in science and technology and social sciences, you will come across a library in their cities after every one furlong .These libraries galore books on every subject, old and new, on any subject you can think of. They are equipped with comfy sitting and reading chairs and tables and are open for eight hours to all and sundry. In some cities they are open even on Sundays.
A notable feature of developed countries is that they have formulated their educational system on such a pattern in which the students have to consult per force umpteen books for preparing themselves for the examination. The word wrote is unknown to the students They have to take initiative themselves and find answers to the questions asked from them in the examination papers which naturally then develops in them the habit to consult books.
What a pity that we are far behind them in this respect. In the good old days even the Municipal Committees and Municipal Corporations used to run many public libraries in the big cities. They also ran many reading rooms in Mohallas of the cities which were visited by the inmates of the Mohallas to read newspapers and magazines present in them. No longer is this case now.
In the same manner, every college worth its salt used to have a library fully equipped with books on various subjects for which adequate funds were provided by the government to their Principals for purchase of new books every year. Time was when qualified persons having done their masters in library science used to man the libraries in the country.
It is pity that no effort was made by any government since long to promote library culture which has been on the wane.
