Top 10 Libraries in IITs: The Knowledge Repositories

The scope of libraries in IITs is much more than being a collection of good books. They support the entire range of informational and scholarly needs of students, faculty, research scholars and staff of the premier engineering colleges of India. They provide access to some of the best digital and printed resources worldwide as well as up-to-date information services.

Here are some of the best libraries IITians have access to:

1. Central Library, IIT Bombay

The Central Library of IIT Bombay is also one of the central pillars of the institute. Housed in a full-fledged five-storey building, this library has a book bank where textbooks are offered on loan to poor students. Through the library, students can also take books, journals, video cassettes and photocopies from libraries of a number of other institutions too, which include other IITs, IISc, IIG, TIFR, BARC,NITIE, NCST, TISS, IGIDS and NICT.

This library houses about 5,00,000 books, theses, dissertations, reports, standards and pamphlets as well as 1,000 CDs and 231 DVDs. It subscribes to 450 print periodicals and offers web-based access to more than 12,000 journals, 450 books and 10 databases. It is also the repository of all research that takes place at IITB.

2. Central Library, IIT Delhi

IIT Delhi has a Central Library and 18 departmental libraries. The Central Library has a collection of over 3 lakh books, theses, journals, video cassettes and CDs in the fields of Science, Engineering, Management, Humanities and Literature. Fully computerized, the library uses LibSys software, which is a multi-user integrated library management system.

IITD is also the Headquarters of the ‘Indian National Digital Library in Engineering Sciences and Technology (INDEST) Consortium’ which subscribes to electronic resources at discounted rates for its member engineering and technological institutions. Currently, as many as 62 centrally-funded government institutions such as IITs, NITs, IIITs, IIMs, IISc Bangalore etc subscribe through electronic resources through it.

The Library is part of the campus LAN (based on fibre optics). Its sub-LAN has 20 terminals, 2 terminal controllers and 5 servers. Besides, the library has 97 PCs with 65 of them connected to the Internet

3. Central Library, IIT Kharagpur

Started in a small room in the Old Building in 1951, IIT KGP’s Central Library has grown to be the biggest pillar to support the academic activities of the institute. It is housed in two buildings: the Main Building and the Annex Building. The Main Building houses Books, Theses and Standards while the Annexe Building houses Bound Journals, Current Periodicals, CD-ROM/DVD-ROM Databases and lecture of various video courses.

Kept open from 8 am to 12 pm on all days (except Institute holidays), the Central Library uses Libsys for library management. It has a collection of more than 3,50,000 documents and subscribes to 300 print journals. Today, it is admirably known as one of the largest and richest technical libraries in Asia. It caters to needs of about 10,000 students, 700 faculty members and over 1,000 staff members across 19 departments, 8 schools, 7 centres and 15 research facilities of IIT Kharagpur.

Equipped with modern facilities, it has multitude of print and electronic resources such as books, journals, theses, reports, micro-documents, patents, standards, video cassettes, CDs, DVDs and online databases etc. The Central Library includes a full-fledged Digital Library which has an institutional digital repository and uses open source software called DSpace.

4. Central Library, IIT Madras

The 6-floor Central Library of IIT Madras sits at the centre of the national forest in the middle of Chennai. Aesthetically designed, this library has several large air-conditioned reading rooms, computer labs and lounges. Each floor of the building has a different colour scheme. There is a semester-long loan section (which used to be in the basement earlier) too. The loan section opens only once a semester. There are long queues of students who wait in the line in the hope of getting a few textbooks for the semester and save some money.

On the first and second floor, students can loan books for shorter duration. On the second floor, there is an impressive computer facility. Other floors house huge reference sections, discussion rooms, reading rooms and lounges.

Well-equipped with modern facilities, the IITM Central Library holds 9001:2008 certification by TUV NORD of Germany for establishment and maintenance of quality library system, services and procedures. It implements Integrated RFID Technology, ISO-9001:2000 Standards, Contactless Smart Card Enabled Access Control System etc. and has a seating capacity of 200 people at once. The Digital Knowledge Centre has 101 computer systems that offer access to a large number of e-resources.

5. P K Kelkar Library, IIT Kanpur

P K Kelkar Library (formerly known as Central Library) of the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur has a collection of over 3,00,000 volumes and subscriptions and more than 1,000 periodicals. Housed in a 3-storey building, it is one of the best libraries in India. Each year, about 4,500 books and journals are added to its collection.

About 35% collection of IITK library is devoted to Science, 32% to Technology, 28% to Humanities & Social Science, and 5% to other areas of study. While students can access online services of library 24X7, the library itself remains open for 358 days a year. One can access it from 8 am to 12 midnight from Monday to Friday, 9 am to 12 midnight from Saturday, 9 am to 5:30 pm on Sunday and holidays and round-the-clock on examination days.

6. Lakshminath Bezbaroa Central Library, IIT Guwahati

The Lakshminath Bezbaroa Central Library at IIT Guwahati houses about 1,50,000 textbooks, reference books, back volumes, standards, and conference proceedings as well as CD-ROMs, audio tapes, video tapes, and slides. It subscribes to over 400 periodicals and has procured e-books in several subject areas. A member of INDEST-AICTE Consortium and DBT eLibrary Consortium (DeLCON), Lakshminath library provides online access to some of the science & engineering abstracting database services, such as Scopus, INSPEC, MathSciNet, SciFinder Scholar, Web of Science etc.

Library users are expected to set their cell phones to ‘silent’ mode and move to designated areas like the enclosed stairwell or the entrances, when they want to use it. Food is prohibited in the library as food remnants left over may cause staining or mould growth in books and attract insects and rodents.

7. Mahatma Gandhi Central Library, IIT Roorkee

The Mahatma Gandhi Central Library (MGCL) at IIT Roorkee started in 1848 with just a few hundred donated books. Today, its collection has grown to over 3,50,000 documents in different forms of media. The building can accommodate over 500 readers at once and has about 90,000 sq ft of space that is fully air conditioned.

The entire building is a wi-fi zone and there are 75 user terminals too. The open reading room has a seating capacity of 80 people.

8. Main Library, IIT-BHU

The Main Library of IIT-BHU has a huge collection of books on Engineering, Science and Technology. It also has a small collection of books on Humanities and Social Sciences. You can find some of the very old books here along with new periodicals, codes and standards etc. It is also connected to a huge collection of online education infrastructure, including e-resources, e-books, e-journals, databases and OPAC.

It has over 1,30,000 reference books, general books, text books, periodicals, theses and CDs. There are 74 PCs, 1 NAS server and 2 other servers in the library.

The library has a special collection for SC/ST category students. Here, books are issued only to reserved category students and are released to general category students only if there is no demand from students of reserved categories. There is a separate reference collection which includes encyclopedias, dictionaries, handbooks, technical data, almanacs, atlases, bibliographies and CD-ROMs etc.

9. Central Library, IIT Gandhinagar

The Central Library of IIT Gandhinagar too has a rich collection of books, text books, reference books and CDs etc. in the fields of Electrical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Computer Science, Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Humanities and Social Sciences. The library is in the process of adding to its collection of books.

The library subscribes to a number of print and electronic research journals. The students of the Institute are offered access to some of the most reputed online scientific databases such as American Mathematical Society, American Chemical Society, ASME, IEEE, MathScinet, American Physical Society, Nature, Science-Direct, Annual Reviews, JSTOR and SpringerLink.

10. IIT Jodhpur Library

IIT Jodhpur Library is quickly coming up as a strong support to the teaching and research activities of the institute. It provides library and information services to the students, faculty members and staff members of the institute. Located on the ground floor of Academic Block I, the library has a rich and growing collection of books in the fields of Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics, Computer Science, Electrical & Electronics Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Humanities, Social Sciences and Life Sciences. It also subscribes to a wide range of reputed databases, scholarly journals, newspapers and magazines.

Its collection includes text books, reference books, research materials and a book bank which can be accessed through a library catalogue. The library also maintains an Institutional Digital Repository which has printed and electronic copies of B.Tech and M.Tech project reports, faculty publications and theses.