Recent trip to the National Library of India

I took my colleague from Chennai to the National Library last week .This was her first visit to the city and I wanted to show off some of the city’s important heritage centres. The National Library is currently housed in two gorgeous buildings.Both the new and the old buildings looked impressive from outside.
 It was around one in the afternoon. I saw a huge crowd in the foyer .At the first impression I felt they were visitors .However I soon realized the employees were filling up investment forms and were there to meet the agents. Inside we had to sign on visitors registers at every point to gain access to various departments. The reading room had some readers. The display area which had on display works of writers from different states of India had no takers. I saw lot of security guards everywhere. There were more employees than users. Employees were sitting around tables and seemed to have all the time in the world. The journals section had few local publications on display with no readers. The lending section was slightly active .The library is still completely closed access and the systems look outdated.


We went to the children’s section. Initially I thought we were entering a storehouse for discarded material .But realized that on one side was the sorting division and heaps of unattended mail were stacked on tables. We did not find any workers here. The children’s section had few items on display. Again security was strict but did not understand what were they trying to guard. There was nothing and the person who was on duty did not have any clue to what the section was all about.

I do not think my colleague was too impressed with what she saw apart from the buildings which are truly imposing. It is a welcome move that the digital library is shaping up well including now available access to all leading e-jornals database from the library. Check this out
http://www.nationallibrary.gov.in/journal.php