IRFAN Husain's 'A treasure trove in Clifton' (Nov 4) is an excellent write-up, alluring especially for those handful who still hold books as their first passion. The society where seats of learning have turned into commercial entrepreneurships, outlets for books have been replaced by jewellery and cosmetic shops, advancement of knowledge and learning is treated as a useless activity.

However, the fact is that establishing/maintaining chronicles and record of antiquity is a real service to the nation certainly not a mean achievement.

The Sindh Archives is one such place; 'bibliophiles vision of paradise' as has been rightly emphasised by Mr Husain.

The Sindh Archives, housed in an architecturally attractive edifice at Clifton, was established by the provincial government as a directorate under the information and archives department. Through its efforts, the archives has been able to accumulate one of the richest, extensive and enviously protected centuries-old government records, books and literary rare material which otherwise would have been lost to the dustbin of history.

The motivation behind this scheme essentially was not only to preserve national information of antiquity but make this vital knowledge easily accessible to future generation researchers.

I have the privilege of visiting Sindh Archives on several occasions since 1998. But each time I noticed significant improvement not only in the overall environment but also in collection of books and manuscripts which has now increased substantially.

During my latest visit, I found in the library a number of old volumes on history and sociology of Sindh which were recently purchased by the department from a British collector.

However, to my utter astonishment, there is hardly any increase noticed in the number of readers or researchers to such an excellent facility. Unfortunately, it is a city like Karachi with more than 16 million people and having the highest rate of literacy in the country that people are not taking any interest in such an excellent reservoir of knowledge.

While there can be innumerable reasons for the common man to have lost interest in books but not taking benefit by research scholars from the archival material is beyond comprehension. In my opinion, there would be two major reasons. First, over the past 10 years, commerce/business education has attained primacy over the social sciences because of its commercial and material value; besides, its books are easily available in the city and accessible on the Internet.

Another reason is that our higher seats of learning do not encourage scholars to approach the archival material though Sindh Archives has established an atmosphere where researchers can study unhindered.

I propose that the provincial ministry of information take necessary steps to establish rapport with educational institutions and also publicise, through media, activities of Sindh Archives so that readers and researchers all over the country may be acquainted with its facilities and take advantage from the knowledge available there.

Besides, there are numerous old libraries spread over the length and breadth of the province established by individual collectors. These libraries contain old and rare manuscripts.

The collections of Agha Badruddin at Garhi Yasin, Mir Ali Ahmed Talpur at Hyderabad and libraries of Pir Hisamuddin and Pir Ali Muhammad Rashidi are a few remarkable mentions.

I suggest that the Sindh Archives establish contact with individual book lovers so that treasure chests of knowledge available with them may also be made useful for scholars. It should also provide them with the latest techniques of preserving manuscripts.

MANZOOR H. KURESHI
Karachi