Mysore/Mysuru: Ending the long wait of lakhs of Mysureans, District Minister S.T. Somashekar inaugurated the new and more spacious City Central Library building at People’s Park premises in Nazarbad here this morning.
Primary and Secondary Education Minister S. Suresh Kumar inaugurated the Digital Library, while Mayor Tasneem inaugurated a book expo.
MLA L. Nagendra presided. MLAs G.T. Devegowda and S.A. Ramdas, MLC Sandesh Nagaraj, Deputy Mayor C. Sridhar, Corporator M. Satish, MCC Commissioner Gurudatta Hegde, Department of Libraries Director Dr. Satish Kumar S. Hosamani, City Central Library Deputy Director B. Manjunath and other officials were present. The new Library has been built by Karnataka Rural Infrastructure Development Limited (KRIDL) at a cost of Rs. 5.34 crore.
No stage programme
Although the authorities had erected a stage for inauguration, no stage programme happened as the Ministers were reportedly in a hurry to attend other schedules. However, Ministers Somashekar and Suresh Kumar spoke to media persons after inauguration at People’s Park entry gate before leaving the venue.
The new library building has a long history extending over four decades. The then Maharaja of Mysore Nalwadi Krishnaraja Wadiyar constructed the City Central Library on Sayyaji Rao Road in 1915, when the city population was just 40,000. But as a more spacious building was required in accordance with the growth of population, the then Mysore City Municipality on Oct. 9,1979, handed over 400’x340’ area of land in People’s Park to the Libraries Department for the construction of new building, following which tenders were invited on Jan. 6, 1982. However, the construction did not commence for some reasons. Later, Dr. M. Veerappa Moily, who was the Education Minister then, laid the foundation stone for the new building on June 20, 1991. But the construction again hit a roadblock due to issues concerning handing over the construction to private contractors. Thereafter the project went into a limbo.
But the project got a push when Vasu became Chamaraja MLA in 2013 Assembly polls. Vasu as an MLA, along with his then fellow MLA S. Suresh Kumar, who is now Primary Education Minister, brought to the notice of the Legislative Assembly Appeals Committee in Mar. 2014 on the New Library building not taking off despite being allotted a vast area of land in the heart of the city. Vasu had suggested the Committee to construct a modern building with all necessary infrastructure and a Digital Library for students appearing for Civil Services and other such competitive exams.
Following Vasu’s initiatives, the construction of the new Library gained fresh traction with the Library Department submitting a fresh proposal to construct the building at an estimated cost of Rs. 4.80 crore. After the Project got fresh Government sanction, the construction finally took off in Jan. 2017 with the Government entrusting the works to KRIDL. The construction was completed in Mar. 2020. Now, after a long wait of over four decades when the new Library was first proposed in 1979, District Minister Somashekar inaugurated the new building constructed by KRIDL at a cost of Rs.5.34 crore, which includes building cost of Rs. 4.99 crore and compound wall construction cost of Rs.35 lakh.
This post was published on September 18, 2020 6:39 pm