The Gaya Central Library. Picture by Suman

Gaya, Oct. 4: The 157-year-old District Central Library, located north of Gandhi Maidan here, is all set to get a modern, well-equipped children’s corner.

Raja Ram Mohan Roy Foundation of the central government has initiated steps to set up the children’s corner in the library. The foundation has sanctioned Rs 2 lakh for the purchase of two computers, a television, video games and a DVD.

According to the guidelines of Raja Ram Mohan Roy Foundation, multimedia and Internet facilities will be provided to children. Also, some illustrated magazines and books would be purchased from the sanctioned money. Electric wiring and partition work for the children’s corner have already been completed. Children will start enjoying the facilities very soon. We have sought tentative date for the inauguration and hopefully the children’s corner will open by Children’s Day on November 14, Birendra Agarwal joint secretary of the trust formed to run the library told The Telegraph.

Children from six to 16 years will be enrolled at the children’s corner. Primarily, we plan to enrol 50 children. However, we are facing problem fixing the time for children. In the morning, they are in their schools. In the evening, guardians will have to accompany the kids, which will be a problem for the latter.

“Normally, the library remains open for readers from 8am to 11am and from 4pm to 7pm and we are trying to adjust the timing to suit the routine of children,” Agarwal said. In another step initiated towards the revival of this very old library, some intellectuals of Gaya town have joined hands. Magadh University professor of botany, S.N. Chakhaiyar, Ajit Agarwal, owner of a very old bookshop Sahitya Sadan, and some others have initiated steps to chalk out plans to add more intellectuals to the list.

The library boasts of more than 35,000 books but most of them are very old ones published during the British rule in India.

Now, the library needs to be equipped with latest books besides, computer and the Internet facility that can attract the readers. Facilities for blind students, too, are available here. At least 35 books in Braille were purchased around seven years ago.

These books in brail have been divided in four categories — classes I, II, III and IV. However, no blind student visits the library.

Established in 1854 by the British government, the library was known as Gaya Public Library. Then a trust was formed to look after the maintenance and other affairs of the library. The district judge of Gaya was made ex-officio chairperson of the trust. However, around 23 years ago, in 1988, the library was renamed District Central Library on the initiative of the Bihar government. Then the state government had promised to provide funds every year but the promise is yet to be fulfilled, trust joint secretary Birendra Agarwal told The Telegraph.