Telangana to set up libraries in all government schools

Not to be left behind the private and corporate schools, the State government has decided to set up libraries in all government and local body schools across the State.

Apart from establishing libraries in the 5,000 government and local body schools, the initiative also is to set up full-fledged facilities in 2,732 high schools including 998 upper primary schools.

Towards setting up the libraries, the School Education department has decided to provide 120 books to each of these libraries. The officials are planning to procure these books from the National Book Trust (NBT).

After setting up libraries in 5,000 government primary schools, the State government has permitted the department to provide 6 lakh books in these schools. Accordingly, the process of printing these books has recently been commenced by the Government Textbook Press. Similarly, the books that help students in improving their reading skills will be



made available in the libraries coming up in the government high schools.

With digital/online studies, that relied on television sets and computers, of the Covid-19 pandemic period giving way to the return to physical classes, several students reportedly been struggling with basic reading and writing skills. The department as a means to revive and improve these skills among the school students, has launched ‘Tholimettu’, the Foundational Literacy Numeracy programme.

As part of this programme, the libraries were being established in the schools with different varieties of books. Once the libraries are operational, the schools have been instructed to conduct the library period daily for at least 15 minutes.

The department has directed teachers to ensure students read the subject books along with other books made available in the library. They were also directed to ensure that students achieve basic competence levels.