http://isbn.gov.in/ Government of India Ministry of Human Resource Development 07-April-2016 18:24 ISTUnion HRD Minister Smt. Smriti Zubin Irani Launches ISBN Portal ISBN, Now a Click Away! The Union Minster of Human Resource Development Smt. Smriti Zubin Irani launched a portal for registration and allotment of International Standard Book Number (ISBN) at a function held in New Delhi today. The Union Minister said that the ISBN portal has been created in a short period of time, to facilitate publishers as well as the authors to register forISBN online. This interactive automated system would provide fast and efficient services in a stipulated time frame to the Publishers and Authors as well.She added that after the feedback from the publishers, a mobile app in the regional languages would also be launched in order to reach out to more and more publishers and authors across the country. She hoped that the publishers and authors from small towns would also be benefited from this initiative. To address the problem of free download of works of authors from the internet, she assured the book writing fraternity that the issue will be discussed with the concerned ministries including DeitY which will be shared with the states.Prof. Narendra Kohli, eminent author was the Guest of Honor on the occasion. Speaking about the ISBN he said that in present times, ISBN has become an important part of publishing sector. He further said that this online system is a good initiative towards providing enhanced accessibility to the publishers and authors.Shri Amish Tripathi, well-known author was the Chief Guest on the occasion. He said that, “ISBN gives an identity to a book. If you do not have it, the bookshops will not sell it.” He observed that ISBN is free in India unlike other countries like US and UK where publishers need to pay huge money for its registration. He further added that ISBN was manual till now and since it is online from today, it will help publishers from different parts of the country to get registration done easily and will save their time also.Earlier, Smt. Aparna Sharma, Joint Secretary (BP & CR) welcomed the guests and informed that ISBN Portal is a part of Government’s e-governance initiative for streamlining the process of registration and make it user friendly.Dr Rita Chowdhury, Director, NBT, India proposed the vote of thanks. She hoped that through this user friendly system, the publishers and authors would find it easy to register for ISBN.BACKGROUNDRaja Rammohun Roy National Agency for ISBN, (Book Promotion and Copyright Division), under Department of Higher Education had organized the event for launch of ISBN portal. ISBN is a unique number used to identify monographic publications. Displayed in barcode format, ISBN is a 13 character identification allotted by International ISBN Agency based in UK through the National ISBN Agency. It provides access to bibliographic data bases used by the book industry and libraries to provide information. Raja Ram Mohan Roy National Agency for ISBN is responsible for ISBN registration in the country and is affiliated to UK based International Agency. The ISBN Nos. are allotted free of cost. Over a period of time with the growth of the publishing industry and awareness about ISBN, the request for ISBN has increased exponentially. Efforts have been made from time to time to streamline the operations of the agency which caters to the requirement of the applicants of the entire country. In this direction an attempt is being made by designing the ISBN online portal http://isbn.gov.in to further streamline the operations. The ISBN portal seeks to completely automate the process of seeking application, their examination and allotment of ISBNs. The developed software has several modules – users’ registration, online application submission, ISBN generation which includes ISBN generation request from the National Agency to the International Agency at UK. The automation process also seeks to maintain inventory as well as process the data that will be provided by the users. There will be doing away with receipt of hard copy of any document unless considered appropriate for establishing the identity of the applicant and for confirming the book publishing activity. Taking forward the Government’s ambitious Digital India campaign, the Ministry of Human Resource Development’s endeavor will ensure: ease of registration, enhanced accessibility, wider transparency, trust and credibility and greater efficiency for the book writing fraternity in the country.*******GG/DS/RT/isbn Prof. N.LAXMAN RAO, President, Telangana Library Association Member, Advisory Board, National Library, KolkataUGC-Emeritus Fellow (2009-11) Professor in Library and Information Science, Osmania University, Hyderabad (super-annuated). Formerly Director, UGC-Academic Staff College (2006-8). Formerly President of Indian Association of Teachers in Library and Information Science (IATLIS) and Association of British Scholars (AP Chapter) .