The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : British Library in for major facelift

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Nov 26, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

British Library in for major facelift

By Our Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD, NOV 25. The British Library is opening up and in a major way at that.

From catering to a select section of readers, the British Council's bookstore in the city is now throwing open its doors to a variety of book lovers, including children.

Visible changes

The changes, with the entry of kids last year, are already being felt with Sundays witnessing readers coming in families and dads and moms curling up with colourful books and reading out to their young ones.

Readers' Clubs for children are also being mooted. A list of children's books will be given to Club members, who will go to schools and sensitise both peers and school authorities. Workshops for parents and teachers, to create a reading environment at home and school will be conducted as well.

The Hyderabad branch of the British Council's 11 libraries in the country is set for a major facelift too, says manager, K.Sudhakar Goud. "By February next year, the library will not be the same," says Mr. Goud. A disabled access, more computers and a change in design of the interiors are in the offing.

Online version

Yet another change is the online version of the library, which in Mr. Goud's words, is the 12th office of the Council. This, apart from the online indexes and online borrowing facilities offered, will change the membership fashion as well, with three categories of members expected to be in place next year. These will include regular library members, online members and those who have both offline and online memberships.

Further, a Virtual Private Network will soon enable members to borrow books that are not available in the local British Library from branches in other cities. Even a travelling member can borrow a book from a British Library in whichever city he or she is, and return the book at any branch.

The library's existing collection covers arts and culture, literature and fiction, social sciences, history, economics, engineering, information technology, law, management, science and technology apart from educational videos, periodicals and newspapers from the UK.

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