The State Central Library Hyderabad, () () known as the State Central Library (SCL) earlier known as ''Kutub Khana Asafia'', is a

public library A public library is a library, most often a lending library, that is accessible by the general public and is usually funded from public sources, such as taxes. It is operated by librarians and library paraprofessionals, who are also Civil servic ...

Hyderabad Hyderabad is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part of Southern India. With an average altitude of , much ...

Telangana Telangana is a States and union territories of India, state in India situated in the Southern India, south-central part of the Indian subcontinent on the high Deccan Plateau. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, ele ...

. The library was first established in 1891 at a location in Abids where the General Post Office is today situated. The library was shifted to its present location in 1936 and today is one of the most imposing structures in the city. The building housing the library was granted heritage status in 1998 by

INTACH The Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) is a non-profit charitable organisation registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860. In 2007, the United Nations awarded INTACH a special consultative status with the ...

, Hyderabad. The building has been included in ''2025 World Monuments Watch'' compiled by

World Monuments Fund World Monuments Fund (WMF) is a private, international, non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of historic architecture and cultural heritage sites around the world through fieldwork, advocacy, grantmaking, education, and training ...

The library is located in the Afzal Gunj on the banks of the River Musi. Today the library occupies of space. The library houses half a million books and magazines including some rare

Palm-leaf manuscript Palm-leaf manuscripts are manuscripts made out of dried palm leaves. Palm leaves were used as writing materials in the Indian subcontinent and in Southeast Asia dating back to the 5th century BCE. Their use began in South Asia and spread to ot ...

s. This library is the apex of the state's library system. The library today is poorly maintained and is without proper infrastructure. The furniture is damaged and the collection of books and manuscripts are not properly catalogued.

History

The library was set up as personal library of a scholar Moulvi Syed Hussain Bilgrami in 1891. It was later renamed as Asafia State Library in the honour of Asaf Jah dynasty. The library was shifted to its current location in 1936. The foundation stone of the proposed building was laid in 1932 by Nizam Mir Osman Ali Khan. Around Rs 5 lakh and about of land at Afzalgunj was allotted for the construction of new building. The library was designed by British architect Vincent Jerome Esch. Construction of this building was part of a proposal by

M. Visvesvaraya Sir Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya (Moːkśguṇam Viśveśvarayya; 15 September 1861 – 12/14 April 1962), also referred to by his initials, MV, was an Indian civil engineer, administrator, and statesman, who served as the 19th Dewan of Mysore ...

who was appointed by Nizam to redesign the Musi riverfront following the

1908 floods Nineteen or 19 may refer to: * 19 (number) * One of the years 19 BC, AD 19, 1919, 2019 Films * ''19'' (film), a 2001 Japanese film * ''Nineteen'' (1987 film), a 1987 science fiction film * '' 19-Nineteen'', a 2009 South Korean film * '' Dici ...

. It is reported that the construction of building was personally supervised by then State Architect and Designer Aziz Ali. After the completion of construction, the Asafia Library was shifted to the present building in 1936 to mark Nizam VII's Silver jubilee. In 1941, the ''Asafia State Library'' celebrated its Golden Jubilee. When the Hyderabad Public Libraries Act became law in 1955, Asafia State Library was declared as the State Central Library for the

Hyderabad State Hyderabad State () was a princely state in the Deccan region of south-central India with its capital at the city of Hyderabad. It is now divided into the present-day state of Telangana, the Kalyana-Karnataka region of Karnataka, and the ...

. An annexe building was constructed in 1961 to augment accommodate the growing collections of the state library.

Collection

Book racks in State central library Hyderabad

The Library has a collection of around five hundred thousand books published since the early 19th century, and Hyderabad Samachara, a monthly newspaper published by HEH Mir Osman Ali Khan, Asaf Jah VII in 1941. The library had a collection of about 17,000 rare and valuable manuscripts dating back to 5th and 6th centuries which were later transferred to the Andhra Pradesh Oriental Manuscripts Library.

Digitalisation

The first phase of computerisation and networking in libraries through e-Grandhalaya software developed by

National Informatics Centre The National Informatics Centre (NIC) is an Indian government department under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). It provides infrastructure, IT Consultancy, IT Services including but not limited to architecture, ...

has begun. The project will begin on an experimental basis in Warangal and Hyderabad. Over 40,000 books have already been digitised at SCL with the help of Carnegie Mellon University's ''Universal Online Library Projects.'' The digitised works include titles in

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

, English, Telugu,

Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...

and Persian languages.

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The institution was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools. In 1912, it became the Carnegie Institu ...

provides the funding for this project.

Restoration

The library, which has been crying out for attention for many years, will finally be restored at an estimated cost of ₹7.35 crores. The restoration work is expected to be completed in 18 months, will have digital portal where about 45,550 rare books, including Urdu, Persian, and Arabic as well as English.

References

External links