CHENNAI: One of the landmark libraries in the country, the Anna Centenary Library at Kotturpuram would be thrown open to the public by Chief Minister M Karunanidhi on Wednesday.
In every sense a world-class repository of books, the library, spread over eight acres, would be the second biggest of its kind in Asia and the biggest in South Asia. At any given time, about 1,250 persons can be seated.
An eco-friendly green library, whose foundation was laid in 2008, the building boasts of natural lighting for better reading and houses more than 1.2 million books, e-journals, e-books and a wide range of publications on assorted subjects. Jawaharlal Nehru University, IITs and IIMs have been requested to provide their online public access catalogs to enable procurement of the same titles by ACL.
On the ground floor, more than 40,000 books, besides journals and short films, await children. The fully air-conditioned building has a special carpeted floor for them. There are artificial trees, walls adorned with cartoon characters and a lush green landscape, all brought to life by art director and master craftsman Thotta Tharani. The floor has been designed in Lilliputian style including wooden chairs, tables and book racks. And if one is hungry, there is a state-of-the-art food court.
The library has a separate section in the ground floor for the visually impaired, containing 25,000 braille enabled titles, with a facility to convert any book in to its braille equivalent. On the fourth floor, one can have a look at a collection of Tamil manuscripts.