HP: Students sit, read books on road to protest against lack of basic facilities in library

College students decided to highlight the issue of abysmal conditions of libraries by studying on the road outside the government district library in Dharamshala.

Shimla, Jan 12: Libraries form part and parcel of every child's growing up years. Unfortunately, in India, most public libraries are in a sorry state of affairs.

If they have a good collection of books, then there won't be proper seating arrangements or unfriendly librarians and vice versa.

Lack of good libraries is one of the reasons because of which children in India are not encouraged to take up reading as a hobby.

In picturesque Dharamshala, Himachal Pradesh, college students decided to highlight the issue of abysmal conditions of libraries by studying on the road outside the government district library in the city.

The unique protest on Thursday saw several students sitting in rows on the pavement leading to the library. During their silent protest, young readers were seen reading their favourite books and magazines under the open sky.

The teenagers allege that the library, the main one in the entire city, is bereft of basic facilities like seating arrangements and toilets.

"Himachal Pradesh: College students sat to study on the road outside government district library in Dharamshala yesterday to raise a protest against lack of basic facilities like seating and toilets at the library," tweeted ANI.

"Along with getting our reading materials for college curriculum, we come to the library to read both fiction and non-fiction. We are students and we can't buy all books.

"Library is the repository of reading materials. However, there is no proper seating arrangement in the library. The toilets too are in a miserable state," said a college-goer who took part in the protest.

"This is a silent protest to highlight how ill-managed the library is. If authorities can't provide us with a good and functional library, where will we get books from?" he added.

While the protest attracted a lot of attention, authorities are yet to issue any statement in this regard.

OneIndia News