Dear Friends:
 
Madras Library Association 
and 
Roja Muthiah Research Library Trust
 
invite you to a 
 
Lecture by
Subbiah Arunachalam
(Distinguished Fellow, M S Swaminathan Research Foundation, Chennai
Visiting Professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies, 
Bangalore) 
 
On
National Knowledge Commission and its implication on Libraries
 
Date: 27 November 2007
 
Time: 5.30 p.m.
 
Venue:
Roja Muthiah Research Library
3rd Cross Road, Central Polytechnic Campus
Taramani, Chennai 600 113
Phone: 2254 2551 / 2
 
(Tea will be served at 5.00 p.m.)
 
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Short CV of Prof. Subbiah Arunachalam
 
Subbiah Arunachalam started his career as a research chemist, but 
found his calling in information science. An avid admirer of the 
printed word right from school days, it was while he was a student 
at the Indian Institute of Science his native flair for searchig 
information came to be recognised. In the past four decades, he has 
been a student of chemistry, a laboratory researcher, an editor of 
scientific journals, the secretary of a scholarly academy of 
scieces, and a teacher of information science. For the past 12 years 
he is a volunteer with the M S Swaminathan Research Foundation and 
is associated with the Foundation's information and communication 
technology-enabled rural development project. He is an honorary 
fellow of CILIP, a life member of IASLIC and a member of ASIST. He 
is on the editorial boards of eight international refereed journals 
including Journal of Information Science, Scientometrics, Journal of 
Community Informatics, and Current Science. His current research 
interests include improving information access both for scientists 
and for the rural poor; scientometrics, and open access. He has 
travelled extensively and delivered talks in more than twenty 
countries. He is on the Executive Committee of the Global Knowledge 
Partnership, on the international advisory board of IICD, The Hague, 
and a trustee of the Electronic Publishing Trst for Development. His 
papers have had an influence on Indian science policy. 
 
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Summary of the talk
 
The past two decades have seen a tremendous transformation in India. 
Largely thanks to the late Prime Minister Mr P V Narasimha Rao and 
his Finance Minister Prof. Manmohan Singh, a new era was ushered in 
and like Hercules unchained India started realizig her potential and 
today we are among the fastest growing economies in the world and 
capital is flowing in at a rate unimaginable only a few years ago. 
All of a sudden, the world found that they needed young Indian 
professionals, to start with in the IT industry but later on also in 
management and manufacturing industry. It became clear to the rising 
middle class in India that the learned would be welcome everywhere. 
The oft repeated cliche that knowledge is power became true in the 
lives of many young people. India as a whole has come to realise how 
knowledge can bring about great transformations. It is this 
realization that led to the setting up of the Knowledge Commission. 
 
I will talk about the mandate of the Commission and its working. In 
particular, I will dwell upon the work and recommendations of two 
working groups, viz. the WG on Libraries and the WG on open and 
distance education. And talk about how the benefits of the knowledge 
revolution could be made more inclusive, a challenge which needs to 
be addressed immediately. I will touch upon the implications of the 
Commission's recommendations for libraries - mainly public 
libraries, but also research libraries. 
 
-Subbiah Arunachalam
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Hope to see you on 27th.
 
With best wishes,
 
L. R. Gowri 

Secretary, MALA