December 7, 2018
Bangla Govt doubles allocation for rural libraries
The State is going about at a rapid pace with the development of government libraries. This was apparent from the detailed reply given by the Library Services Minister to a question asked in the Assembly on November 22.
He said that the government has allotted Rs 6 crore in financial year (FY) 2018-19 for the infrastructural and book-related development of 2,000 rural libraries. This is double the amount allotted in FY 2017-18, which was Rs 3.2 crore, for 1,455 rural libraries.
As many as 34,000 rare books have been digitised. The work of digitisation of books at the district level is also getting executed with equal responsibility.
In the current financial year, he said, books worth Rs 11.43 lakh were bought for different libraries. At the same time, steps have been taken to fill up the vacant posts of librarians.
It may be mentioned that the condition of libraries in the State has improved a lot in the past seven years, when the Trinamool Congress has been in power. The minister informed the Assembly that the budget of the Library Department has gone up from Rs 14.88 crore in 2010-11 to Rs 50 crore in 2018-19.
Source: Millennium Post
