WHILE the Turkish government has been building large libraries, we the students of the International Islamic University, Islamabad, have been requesting the administration for an increase in library hours for male students.

Our library has a huge collection of valuable books in English, Urdu, Arabic and Persian, besides having engineering journals, and foreign and national magazines.

But the students cannot not use the library when they want because the timings (9.00am to 9.00pm on Tuesday, Thursday, and 8.00am to 3.00pm on Saturday) are arranged in such a way that student hardly get two to three hours to study at the library in the evening after attending their regular classes in the morning.

This short time is not adequate for an engineering or research student. We study mostly in the evenings till late night to complete our tasks, while during this time the library remains closed.

We believe that great libraries build communities and give birth to scientists, economists and many inventions. The library is full of such resources which can broaden our ideas and help us to gain more knowledge.

The students request the authorities concerned to make the library accessible to us for 24 hours at least three days a week and it should also be opened on Sunday so we can study on our weekends too.

Ahmad Mukhtar
Islamabad

Published in Dawn, March 19th, 2020