BHUBANESWAR: The 20th MANLIBNET convention, a joint initiative of KIIT Deemed-to-be-University and Management Libraries Network, was inaugurated on Thursday. The three-day-long event’s theme is ‘Libraries of the future: Emerging Trends’.
Virtually inaugurating the event, National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) Chairman Professor Bhushan Patwardhan said, “Libraries must utilise the modern IT tools to make them future-ready and the librarians must prepare themselves for the challenge.”
They should also bank on more creative ideas to make the libraries as places of attraction so that the readers would be interested to join them and become part of the knowledge-gaining experience, he added.
Speaking on the occasion, vice-chancellor of KIIT professor Sasmitarani Samanta said that knowledge is a basic essential for all in every stage of life.
The libraries must utilise the best of the technologies so that more and more readers will come to the temples of knowledge and in this process, the librarians have a crucial role to play, she added. MANLIBNET general secretary and librarian of Hyderabad’s Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Dr Akhtar Parvez, urged the librarians to be more creative to attract visitors to the libraries of the future.
During the event, the MANLIBNET best creative librarian award for 2020 was given to Dr Bijaylaxmi Routray, for 2021 to Dr Akhtar Hussain and for this year to Dr Dhabal Bhatt.