IN all civilized societies, libraries are considered an essential tool for social, political and economic development and a source of intellectual enlightenment. They play a decisive role in the overall progress of a country. In Pakistan, however, this important source of national progress has received scant attention from the planners during the past 54 years.

In the national five-year plans, education and libraries were placed at the lowest rung of national priorities by the feudal-dominated governments. Consequently, a handful of public libraries, which Pakistan inherited in August, 1947, especially those located in Lahore, suffered much due to lack of adequate financial support, both from the public as well as private sectors.

We take great pride in overstating that Lahore is the cultural and educational capital of the country, but its citizens seem to have done precious little to retain this distinction. Our past record on the promotion of knowledge, publishing new books and setting up new libraries in Lahore hardly provides us any comfort.

At the time of partition, Lahore had three very well stocked and properly managed libraries, two in the private sector and one set up by the University of the Punjab. In the private sector, there were the Punjab Public and the Dayal Singh Trust libraries, in addition to a small municipal library.

Inaugurated by Lord Aitchison in 1884, the Punjab Public Library was the pride of the city until a few years after partition, when it fell on bad days. A combination of factors, including perennial shortage of funds, mismanagement, corruption and managerial sloth, pilferage of books and lack of space contributed to the plummeting of standards at this once efficient library.

Regular visitors to the library allege that several rare manuscripts were stolen from the library but no action was taken to trace the culprits or to retrieve the lost material. Damage thus caused to the library by this wanton act of some individuals with or without the collusive support of the employees was truly irreparable.

Has anyone in the higher echelon of the provincial bureaucracy ordered a probe in the affairs of the Punjab Public Library, and ordered the adoption of such measures as would protect it from a further denuding of basic source materials required by researchers and scholars? To keep this historic library in proper shape public sector organizations and affluent members of society should have come forward to provide it with financial assistance.

The employees of the library, despite their best efforts to maintain its standards, cannot keep the Punjab Public Library in such a functional state as would make it the envy of other libraries in the city and province. To meet the ever-growing needs of the citizens, including students and researchers not only does the library need additional space for storing new titles, but also enough money to buy the latest books in various disciplines. The measly membership fee currently being charged by the library amounts to a drop in the ocean.

There is no dearth of affluent members of society, who are in a position to donate some portions of their wealth for the promotion of knowledge — a job which a well-stocked library can do. The government should also chip in by substantially increasing the amount of grant-in-aid it annually gives to the library, which will go a long way in helping the administration to buy new books and subscribe to journals of repute.