This is an excerpt from the talk given by Dr. K.N. Prasad, Executive Officer, Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science, Rajajinagar Bangalore 560010 at the ‘Librarians Day’ celebrations organized by Mysore Librarians and Information Scientists Association (MyLISA) on 9th August 2010 at MMK & SDM Mahila Vidyalaya, Mysore. The speaker can be reached through his email srels@dataone.in. This report is prepared by Mr. N. Vasantha Raju, Librarian, First Grade Govt. College, Periyapatna, Mysore Dist. The Chief Guest of the event Dr. K.N. Prasad, Executive Officer, Sarada Ranganathan Endowment for Library Science, Bangalore gave a special lecture on “S.R. Ranganathan in the 21st century”. He spoke about the need of revisiting Ranganthan’s contribution in light of the new developments in Information and communication technologies. He mentioned how Ranganathan’s facet analysis is being used by the search engine giants like Yahoo! and others for increasing the efficiency of information retrieval. He linked the epic Ram and Hanuman relationship to the modern information world. If the browser represents Hanuman in seach mode, then the database is the mountain. The information is hidden somewhere. How do you find it? Ranganathan provided a solution in the form of revolutionary system in 1933 through his book called Colon Classification. Prasad pointed how Ranganathan’s five laws were revisited and re interpreted by many scholars across the globe. He said these five laws provided inspiration to other authors and they have presented different principles based five laws. As illustrative examples he cited works such as: ‘Five new laws of librarianship’ by Michael Gorman (1995), ‘Principles of distance education’ by Sanjaya Mishra (1998), Five laws of the software library’ by Mentor Cana (2003), ‘Five laws of children’s librarinship’ by Virginia A. Walter (2004), ‘Five laws of web connectivity’ by Lennart Björneborn (2004); and ‘Five laws of diversity/affirmative action’ by Tracie D. Hall (2004). The Iranian librarian Aliroz Noruzi enunciated five laws of the web exactly similar to Ranganathan’s law by replacing ‘books’ with ‘web’. He elaborated on how each of the five laws applies to the web resources. Prasad mentioned some of the stalwarts of library and information science like Eugene Garfield, Jesse H. Shera acknowledged Ranganathan for his seminal contribution to the international librarianship. He mentioned a few of the examples of how his idea being used in management. He cited the example of Japanese 5 “S” workplace organization principles. He also highlighted the Ranganathan contributions in developing quality standards for Bureau of Indian Standard. Special invitee of the day Prof. Nageshwar Rao, Head Department of Commerce, MMK and SDM College for Women shared his association and experience in dealing with librarians and the importance of the role of librarians in today’s context. Prof. Mallinath Kumbar made the presidential remarks on the occasion. As a part of the librarians day celebration Ranganathan's Monologue on Melvil Dewey audio event (1964 recording of the great librarian S.R. Ranganathan giving a fifteen-minute talk about his connections with Melvil Dewey) was organized. Ranganathan's Monologue on Melvil Dewey can be found at: http://www.miskatonic.org/library/ranganathan-audio.html. Mr. Naganna, Librarian, University of Agricultural College, Mandya, highlighted the various professional activities conducting under the banner of MyLISA for the professional developments. Mrudula student of JSS Public School rendered the invocation and Mrs. Padma, librarian MMK SDM College for Women welcomed the guest. Sri. Siddalinga Swamy of JSS College, Mysore anchored the program. Dr. N.S. Harinarayana, Mr. M.V. Sunil and Dr. M. Chandrashekara Executive members of MyLISA, Mr. Basappa, Secretary MyLISA. Dr. I. R. N. Gouder Library adviser, University of Mysore, Dr. C.P. Ramasesh, Deputy Librarian, UG Library, University of Mysore, Mysore and librarians of various colleges in and aroun Mysore, Mysore university library staff, students and research scholars of the Department of Library and Information Science, university of Mysore attended the event. -- N.S. Harinarayana Department of Library and Information Science University of Mysore, Manasagangotri Mysore 570 006 Off. Ph: (0821) 2419393 -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean.