Sir,
This has reference to the editorial’Dissemination of Knowledge’ (DE,Dec21,2014). The suggestion put forth by the former President of India, APJ Abdul Kalam while inaugurating the 17th National Convention on Knowledge Library and Information Networking’, that efforts must be made to develop libraries at home in order to make them available to all the members of the family and thus raise the level of education in our country, needs to be taken very seriously.It is sad that the habit of reading for pleasure is fast vanishing in the youth of today.The youth, particularly, the students confine their study only to their course books prescribed in their respective classes with the objective of getting through the exams.They rarely go beyond these books to read additional books in order to expand the frontiers of their knowledge.Not only this, the youth of today are often seen engrossed in using their mobile phones, laptops or other such gadgets with the result that very little time is left at their disposal for reading books.There is no doubt that knowledge has been made more easily accessible by Internet, yet the books have their own role and importance for readers of various age groups and varying tastes.
Thus,the need of the hour is that parents should strive hard to inculcate the habit of reading in their children from the early stage of their life.Books need to be gifted to them on their birthdays and other occasions.Parents themselves ought to inculcate this habit in themselves to act as role models for their children and buy books of various types such as travelogues, biographies, storybooks, classics to have a glimpse of different genres.Children should also be taken to Book Fairs to see for themselves the grand and lofty kingdom of books and encouraged to buy books of their taste.Schools ought to arrange lectures and talks by the eminent writers, poets, novelists and playwrights to stimulate interests of the students in the gente of their choice.
Yours etc…
Ashok Sharma
Jammu
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