Learn about hanging libraries in schools in Barpeta Assam.
thehindu.com
https://www.thehindu.com/books/the-writings-on-the-wall/article25191347.ece
The
‘hanging libraries’ of Assam's Barpeta help display the books while keeping
them safe from floodwaters
Rahul Karmakar October 13, 2018 16:00 IST Updated: October 11, 2018 15:46
IST
3-4 minutes
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A few books hung on a piece of rope held in place by three bricks were all
that 12-year-old Utpal Das needed to become a poet and fiction-writer. In
little more than two months, he has penned seven poems and three short
stories. His fourth work of fiction — developed from *Pithar Mel* (‘Meeting
of sweet rice cakes’), a poem from a book picked up from the
school-library-on-rope — has been selected for the wall magazine of his
lower primary school on Jail Road in the outskirts of Assam’s Barpeta town,
about 95 km from Guwahati.
*It’s exciting*
Utpal, in Class V, is from Karertal village. His classmate, Rajeda Khatun,
from the same village, has become an advocate of wildlife conservation
after reading books where animals are the central characters. Both boys
found these books from their school’s unique library, a wall with ropes
strung across it, to which the books are clipped. The wall separates the
teachers’ room from a storeroom.
“We got some books from Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) 10-12 years ago, but
they were kept in trunks and taken out only when required. Insects and damp
damaged them. The hanging library, introduced in our school in August, has
worked wonders,” says Chandana Pathak, who takes turns with six other
teachers at conducting reading classes with library books for at least two
hours a week.
The 56 students at Paschim Kholabhanda L.P. School, on an island in the
Brahmaputra, had never seen a library before. The new hanging library in
their flood-prone school has generated much excitement.
*Rediscovering talent*
“When we pioneered the hanging library concept in Barpeta district
six-seven months ago, the idea was to make the books visible in order to
arrest the declining reading habit among students, which was affecting
their learning. We have so far put up such libraries in 190 schools,” says
Thaneswar Malakar, Barpeta’s Deputy Commissioner and a former Mission
Director of SSA. The district has 1,697 lower primary schools, 303
middle-level schools, and 301 secondary schools.
The hanging idea serves another purpose; it keeps the books safe during
floods. Madhyachar Kholabandha L.P. School, for instance, gets inundated
regularly during floods even though it is built on higher ground. With the
books hanging high, water can’t reach them.
Measures such as the hanging library have helped Barpeta leave other
districts of Assam behind in adding value to education across government
schools. “The new ideas are working to the extent that many students are
leaving private schools,” says Kapil Das, headteacher of Suliyakata Adarsha
L.P. School in Barpeta.
The school drop-out rate has come down too, and frequent visits by
officials to far-flung schools to assess the impact of the programmes have
checked child marriage to some extent.
Students are not the only beneficiaries of this change in the way education
is imparted. “Teachers are rediscovering their talents in singing, playing
an instrument, dancing, acting, painting and various sports,” says Jyotsna
Rani Barman, the district inspector of schools for Barpeta.
The artistic abilities of the teachers are coming together with the gift of
imagination of students like Utpal to make learning fun in Barpeta.
*rahul.karmakar@thehindu.co.in