Page 49 - DLIS104_MANAGEMENT OF LIBRARIES AND INFORMATION CENTRES

Management of Libraries and Information Centres

Notes 7.1 The Working of the Trust

The activities ad programmes of the Trust are initiated, implemented, monitored and controlled
by the EC. Its objectives, activities and the achievements are reviewed from time to time and
designed to meet new challenges which arise in the field of promoting reading habit. The concept
of reading habit or book mindedness as Nehru envisaged was not confined to text books or
professional books or career development books but the emphasis was on general reading, thus
shaping its major aims and objectives.
In the formative years these objectives were:
to produce and to encourage the production of good literature and to make such literature
available at moderate prices to the public:
in furtherance of the above objective, to publish, more particularly books of the following
types in English, Hindi and other languages recognised in the Constitution of India:
the classical literature of India:
outstanding works of Indian authors in Indian languages and their translation from one
Indian language to another:
translation of outstanding books from foreign languages:
outstanding books of modern knowledge for popular diffusion:
to bring out book lists, arrange exhibitions and seminars and take all necessary steps to
make the people book minded:
to establish or promote the formation of regional book trusts in different parts of the
country with objectives similar to those of the Trust.

As of today the main objectives of the Trust are:

Publishing good reading material for all segments of society and for all age groups.
Promoting books and the habit of reading by organizing book fairs and exhibitions
throughout the country and putting up language-wise and genrewise exhibitions of select,
moderately priced books brought out by publishers from the private and public sectors.
Promoting Indian publications abroad, through participation in international book fairs
and putting up exhibition to display select titles brought out by various Indian Publishers.
Promoting the publication of reasonably priced books for higher education. NBT gives
financial assistance to authors and publishers of university level text-books and reference
books.
Promoting of children’s literature. the Trust also works as nodal agency to monitor, coor-
dinate, plan and aid the publication of children’s literature in various Indian languages.
It has established the National Centre for children’s Literature in 1993, to popularize books and
reading habit amongst children. It has been accepted that the most effective measure for promoting
books is book fairs and exhibitions and the NBT has been playing a pioneering role in organizing
book fairs and exhibitions at the international, national, regional and at the rural levels. The book
fairs and exhibitions organised by the NBT have been greatly appreciated by the book lovers and the
book trade because they not only enable the book lovers to witness a large array of books in one
single place but it also provides the opportunity for meeting and interaction between various
segments of the book trade. During these book fairs the NBT also organizes seminars, symposia,
workshops, etc. simultaneously it provides the much needed infrastructural facilities to the book
trade, federations and allied organizations to hold their programmes of similar nature. In order to
promote the interest of the publishers of Indian languages books the NBT offers space and stands on
lower rents. During World Book Fairs, it also offers local hospitality to representatives of developing
countries as also free stands/stalls to enable them to participate in this international event.
The NBT has so far organized 22 National Book Fairs and 14 World Book Fairs. In addition, the
NBT also organizes many book exhibitions at the regional and semi urban levels. Besides it also
organizes special mobile book exhibition in various states. The states covered are Andhra Pradesh,
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