Easing the access to those rare books Bangalore: Need to refer to an old book, and hard-pressed to find it? The Karnataka Knowledge Commission is considering a proposal to set up a library that will house little-used, old books. This is one of the many recommendations made by the study group on libraries, by the state Knowledge Commission to recommend how libraries could be more effectively used in higher education. At a meeting that the study group had with the Knowledge Commission on Monday, the group mooted a proposal to create a repository of lesser-used books, published over a decade ago, so that these can be better maintained and made more easily accessible to the public. Dr PV Konnur, librarian at the Bangalore University and chairman of the study group, said, "Every year, nearly 25 per cent of lesser-used books are dumped; these books are just stocked in portions of the library, and left so poorly maintained that even access to them becomes difficult. The aim is to create a repository of such books, so that a heritage is well-preserved. The library will also help prevent titles from getting lost." There are such repositories already existing in countries like the United States of America and the United Kingdom. Konnur says that Chicago has a repository for rare books that extends over 10 universities. It is hoped that in Karnataka, one university will take up the responsibility to handle the repository, say members of the study group. Dr Konnur adds on: "The proposal is now lying before the Karnataka Knowledge Commission, and Bangalore University has taken up the responsibility of preparing concept papers. After the papers are presented, we will submit a recommendation." SOURCE: DNA - JULY 21, 2009. Read the world as a student of Bangalore varsity Bangalore: Enrolled for research at the Bangalore University and starved of access to international journals? Soon, you will have access to a range of journals right at home, if you have an internet connection. Faculty and students enrolled for a PhD or post-graduation course at the University will have access to the journals. The University's library department has been working on a project that is nearing completion. "The project is at the final stage. We plan to implement it in the next couple of weeks," said Dr PV Konnur, librarian. To begin with, the University will offer the facility to 500 members of its teaching staff, 2000 post-graduate students and 750 research scholars. "The project has been prepared with software developed by a Hyderabad-based company. We will be distributing CDs which work as key discs to the software," says Konnur. Every year, the University spends several lakhs on subscriptions of international journals through the internet. The University Grants Commission (UGC) releases Rs70 crore towards such subscription fees to the 300 universities in the country. However, few students and faculty benefit from this as access to these is restricted to the library. This project at BU has been implemented at an expense of Rs60,000. "We hope that having easier access to these at home will encourage more students and faculty to access the facility," Konnur explained. SOURCE: DNA - JULY 17, 2009. With Best Regards, Raghavendra R Jubilant Biosys Ltd raghupawar@gmail.com -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean.