BIHAR: Bihar's Purnia district has a literacy rate of 51.23 per cent, almost 20 per cent lower than the state average of 70.9 per cent, and has extremely poor book-reading habit among the school children. Till last year, most underprivileged children here didn’t have access to quality education. But things have started to improve since January 25, 2020, when the Purnia district administration launched the ‘Abhiyan Kitab-Daan’ to encourage the practice of donating books to set up public libraries in the region.
In the 12 months, more than a dozen libraries, with books received through donations from students of up to Class XII, have been set up. “We are making all efforts, beyond our official duty, to motivate people to donate books, as we aim to set up at least 100 libraries across the district by March 31 this year. So far, we have received more than 61,000 books from students, teachers, senior citizens and others for the campaign,” says Rahul Kumar, Purnia district magistrate, who took the initiative.
The DM says the people living in other towns, states or countries could also send books directly from online suppliers. “Our campaign has helped set up a library in almost every 246 panchayats, with at least 500 books of curriculum and extra-curriculum subjects,” Kumar says.
These libraries came as a new ray of hope for the poor children. The search of curriculum books of Mukesh Kumar, a student of Class IX and son of a truck driver, has ended at one of the libraries at Parora village in the district.
The library was recently inaugurated with the help of books donated by people across the state under the initiative. “Soon, we will have one lakh books under this initiative. In 2020, despite the Covid-19 lockdown, we received more than 61,000 donated books. After that, the first library with donated books was set up in Parora on January 25 this year,” he says. Laxmi Devi, 45, wife of a farmer at Baisi village, has also heaved a sigh of relief as she won’t have to face further hardship in arranging books for her only daughter Sonal, studying in Class IX at a private school.
“My daughter wants to become a doctor, and now she will not face any problem in finding her books till Class XII as they are available at the library,” Devi says. The campaign got the momentum once elected panchayat representatives, senior citizens and officials from the block to district education levels started participating. The district magistrate says it is needed to inculcate the reading habit among children of schools, in particular, who are becoming addicted to social media platforms.
“This endeavour also inculcates a sense of wider and extensive reading habit which is required for succeeding in competitive examinations such as the UPSC, BPSC, etc.,” he says. Kumar says a committee has been formed with elected panchayat representatives and others to manage the campaign. “The elected panchayat representatives arrange infrastructures such as furniture and the land in the panchayat where a library can be set up,” he says.
He adds that local block development officers (BDOs) and officials of the education department are also being roped in for larger benefits of the poor children. Punia resident Ramesh Kumar, who recently got a job in the Indian Railways after completing graduation, says he will soon donate his books to the district education office to help other aspirants. Niraj Kumar Das, a former mukhiya of Purnia, says he has also donated some chairs and books to set up the libraries. The DM says a letter of appreciation is given to every book d ono r by the district administration.