Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): A ‘Free Library’ for the youths preparing for the Civil Services and other competitive examinations has come up at 10 Number Market in the city.
The Library, which became functional from October 1 this year, has around 2,000 books and volumes of old issues of magazines like Frontline and India Today. The books are on subjects like economics, history, political science, geography and computing. Besides, the library has the entire set of NCERT books for classes 5 to 12 in both Hindi and English and the study material of Drishti, a leading coaching institute for competitive exams.
The Free Library has been started by Youngshala, an organisation of the youth.
“We have three objectives in mind: One, help those who live in small houses and do not have a proper place to study; two, giving access to books and study material free of cost to aspirants who cannot afford them and three, giving them an opportunity to interact and cooperate with others preparing for the same examination,” Roli Shivhare of Youngshala told Free Press.
The place is open from 10 am to 6 pm and can accommodate 15 students at a time. Roli says that in the future, they plan to organise doubt-clearing sessions by experts and motivational speeches by young IAS and other officers.
They also plan to hold counselling sessions from time to time for aspirants who are frustrated or feeling low due to persistent failure in clearing examinations. “There are many youths who keep on appearing in examinations for years on end but do not succeed. They need a dash of hope and motivation,” she says.
Roli says that they would like the users to take ownership of the place. “Ideally, there should be no need for any supervision,” she says.
She said that a free Wi-Fi facility for the users is also under consideration. “We are weighing the pros and cons of providing it,” she says.
