Role of Libraries in Nation Building
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Role of Libraries in Nation Building

The history of the evolution of human civilization cannot be complete without the mention of books and libraries

Post by on Monday, December 6, 2021

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The acquaintance of books, the love of knowledge, and the intellectual and practical effort to establish a library and keep it inhabited, is a symbol of living nations. Books, Institutions of learning, and libraries are the valuable assets of the educational system. They are the basic means of acquiring knowledge and education, and the main keys of every kind of national development. Knowledge is the jewel of humanity; the source of progress; and the key to good governance and leadership. It is the only means which improves the worldly life of a person and helps to achieve the bounties of success and contentment.

Books have a profound effect on human life. They make a person polite and give dignity to his personality, and familiarize man to new levels of consciousness. When a person reads a book, his mind also reflects on it. The deeper the meditation is involved, the deeper the knowledge is gained. Just as food, climate, geography, and economic conditions affect human life, so too do books, libraries, and reading effects and play a positive and important role in human intellectual and economic development, social respect, teaching, and research development. The books are the good friends and the libraries are the solaced places in the world. They eliminate the feeling of loneliness and provide a sense of accompaniment as well as information. If reading is a constant habit, then the human personality develops the qualities of patience, forbearance, philanthropy, generosity, open-mindedness and selflessness, and patriotism, which can lead to the formation of a better social and intellectual society.

A library is an institution that preserves human thoughts, experiences, and observations in the form of books so that the thoughts of a person can be used by thousands of people not only of his generation but also of future generations. The existence of libraries, that is, the arrangement of keeping books in a special place in such a way that they remain safe and can be obtained without any difficulty when needed is found in one form or another from the earliest times. Their presence and absence reflect the cultural trends and preferences of any society. The history of the evolution of human civilization cannot be complete without the mention of books and libraries.

Libraries have been recognized in the civilized world as a symbol of civilization and culture; the fact is that libraries have played a major role in determining the direction and pace of society. The nations that have accepted libraries as such have always been in a position to give something back to the world. On the contrary, whenever the importance of libraries in society was neglected, they lagged in the path of development. Libraries are places of innovation where countless experiences of the human race exist in the form of books. There is an English proverb that “If a disease of doubt and delusion will develop inside you, turn to the library for a wealth of certainty”. If there are no libraries, then all these experiences and experiments will be lost, but the vehicle of civilization has to go far. Some things have taken the form of an accepted principle for centuries, and every conscious nation in the civilized world makes them its top priority. One of them is education. Education and libraries are inseparable; where education is organized, there must be a good library consisting of books on various sciences and arts. No developed nation in the world can live without a library, and its importance and usefulness cannot be denied.

For the economic and educational development of the society, the people living in the society must be aware of the prevailing knowledge and requirements of the times. The biggest sources of knowledge are Madrassas, Schools, Colleges, and Universities. The advancement of knowledge is not possible only through these educational institutions, because they are not generally accessible to the public. Therefore, arrangements should be made for the establishment of public libraries. Similarly, more attention needs to be paid to the establishment and stability of libraries in educational institutions. Because the way to make education universal comes from educational institutions, and it is only through their cooperation that the light of knowledge spreads in the society. Besides this, curriculum requirements in educational institutions are not met by textbooks alone, but it is necessary to read more suitable books, newspapers, and magazines to expand the knowledge of students, increase vocabulary, reading ability, development of ideas, power of expression, comprehension of other’s thoughts, and ideas. Teachers themselves need books and magazines to enhance their teaching ability, keep their information up to date, seek help in explanation and citations.

Libraries are a great source of knowledge and information, where the seekers of knowledge get all kinds of desired knowledge without any restriction and hindrance and everyone can easily use as much as he can. Just as electricity is supplied everywhere from the powerhouse, so as the library is the house of wisdom, from where the light of knowledge is given to the society and the rays of various sciences and arts are transmitted in the minds and brains of the people. But it is a misfortune that the more important the knowledge and the library are in the education system, the more we are neglecting these things today. Our intellectual taste is getting weaker day by day. We have become accustomed to wasting time on extravagant activities instead of seeking knowledge.

The trend of reading books in our society today is rapidly declining, a big reason for which is the internet. It is now much easier to get the desired content with the help of the internet. People now prefer to read books, magazines, and newspapers on the internet instead of visiting libraries. Similarly, the tradition of attracting children to books at home is no more existing. Today’s children are no longer interested in books, but more in watching cartoons or playing online games. Even in schools, children are restricted to extracurricular activities. We have included children in the race to get the highest marks and grades. The disadvantage of this mentality is that man acquires the desired material quickly and easily but this knowledge is not imprinted on his mind due to which the depth of knowledge doesn’t come.

Nowadays, when our interest in teaching and learning is getting less, who cares about the library? Today we are neither building new libraries nor making any arrangements or efforts for the preservation of existing ones. The result is that many important and precious intellectual capital is being sacrificed to insects and termites.The establishment and consolidation of libraries are essential for academic progress. Regarding public welfare, there are numerous organizations and movements which are working in their respective fields for different purposes. But unfortunately, we do not see any welfare organization that specializes in establishing libraries for the promotion of education in a society or reviving ancient libraries. One of the many reasons for our educational backwardness is that we have stopped populating libraries and have lost interest in them. We need to change that attitude, and there must be a well-established library in all the educational institutions containing books on various sciences and arts. The administration should include the establishment of libraries in their development plans related to social welfare and take care of the protection of our ancient libraries which are falling prey to termites today.

 

(The author is a Senior Researcher of Islamic Studies at the Baba Ghulam Shah Badshah University in Rajouri, Jammu & Kashmir. He can be reached at khalid6484@bgsbu.ac.in)

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