Ms Nagarathna's query prompts one to think:
Have we not failed miserably in developing proper bibliographic tools?
How can one compile a comprehensive bibliography without an up to date
national bibliography? The situation in case of books in Indian languages
is even worse. The Indian common person has to depend on the daily
newspapers, popular magazines, etc., for info on new books being
published in India. In fact, these media have been rendering an yeomen
service to the cause of Indian publishing. Ex: The Hindu Book Review
Supplement on Tuesdays, Tribune (Chandigarh), etc.
In spite of technological advances, we are in a situation where we do not
have accurate statistics of book production in India. It is almost
impossible to have a complete perspective of the total Indian publishing
output.
Even after spending hundreds of crores on networks, we cannot know in
which university/public/special library a particular book/journal is available.
Isn't it high time to provide the Indian common person a single window or
a gateway to Indian libraries where he/she can post the query? Can't we
have the presence of all Indian librarians/reference librarians/volunteers at
this window to answer queries through email until all our libraries are
networked online?
Sometimes, I feel that lot of significant and useful work had been done
during the pre-ICT era. How long are we going to neglect the
bibliographic control of Indian publications? How much grey literature
originating from India is just missing our attention? How long are we going
to duplicate cataloguing/classification work in all our libraries?
By the way, as for Ms Nagarathna's query, I would try to send the contact
details of a few Telugu publishers shortly:
Another good source for Telugu books in this area is:
<color><param>0100,0100,0100</param><FontFamily><param>Times New Roman</param><smaller>Dr. Velaga Venkatappaiah, 4-22-27 Ithanagaram, Tenali - 522 201, Andhra Pradesh
Ph: 08644 - 228585
A walking encyclopedia on Telugu books!
T.V. Prafulla Chandra
</color><FontFamily><param>Arial</param><bigger>From: <color><param>0000,0000,8000</param>"A.V. Nagarathna" <