Reimagining India’s Libraries: From Book Repositories To Community Hubs

“By connecting publishers with students and researchers, libraries contribute significantly to the growth and sustainability of India’s publishing ecosystem.”
– Rohit Raj Mirchandani

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Libraries remain important institutional markets for publishers, supporting academic, educational and regional-language publishing while providing readers with sustained access to knowledge. In this conversation, Rohit Raj Mirchandani, Chief Executive Officer of Capital Books Pvt. Ltd., Publisher at Capital Publishing Company, and Founder of Virgo Publishers and Manish Jain, Partner, T V Enterprises/Design Book Studio, Mumbai, share their perspectives on the changing role of libraries, procurement challenges, print-digital integration, multilingual collections and the need to transform libraries into vibrant community and learning space.

AABP: How do you assess the current state of libraries in India?

Rohit: Indian libraries have made notable progress over the past five years, particularly in digital transformation. Academic and college libraries have modernized with e-resources, automation, and research support, while public and school libraries continue to face challenges such as inadequate funding, outdated collections, limited digital infrastructure, and shortages of trained librarians. The major trends include digital-first collections, remote access, AI-enabled discovery, and collaborative learning spaces.

Manish: Indian academic libraries have improved through digital resources and automation, but many public and school libraries still face funding and infrastructure challenges. Over the last five years, there has been greater emphasis on e-resources, online access, and alignment with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.

AABP: What role do libraries play today in supporting the growth of the Indian publishing industry?

Rohit: Libraries play a vital role in supporting the Indian publishing industry by providing a stable and institutional market for publishers, and ensuring access to quality knowledge resources. They help sustain academic, educational, and regional language publishing through regular acquisitions, encourage the adoption of new titles in educational institutions, and increase the visibility and longevity of books. By connecting publishers with students and researchers, libraries contribute significantly to the growth and sustainability of India’s publishing ecosystem.

Manish: Libraries are major institutional buyers that provide long-term visibility to books, support academic publishing, and encourage the publication of quality educational and research content.

AABP: In your opinion, are libraries receiving adequate attention and investment from policymakers and educational institutions?

Rohit: In my opinion libraries are receiving greater attention than before, particularly in higher education through digital initiatives and the implementation of NEP 2020. However, investment remains inadequate, especially in public and school libraries, where funding and infrastructure continue to be major challenges. A more consistent investment is essential to build a strong knowledge ecosystem.

Manish: Progress has been made, but investment remains insufficient, particularly in school and public libraries. Many institutions still allocate limited budgets for books and library development.

AABP: What are the biggest challenges libraries face today—funding, outdated collections, staffing, infrastructure, digital access, or declining readership?

Rohit: The biggest challenges facing libraries today are inadequate funding, rising costs of foreign published books and digital resources due to the currency devaluation mainly, outdated collections, lack of proper digital infrastructure, and declining readership. Addressing these issues requires long term investment and stronger institutional support.

Manish: The key challenges are inadequate funding, delayed book procurement, outdated collections, shortage of trained librarians, uneven digital access, and declining recreational reading among students.

AABP: How has library procurement changed in recent years? Are publishers finding it easier or more difficult to supply books to libraries?

Rohit: Library procurement has become more transparent and technology-driven through e-tendering and digital procurement systems like GEM and CPP. However, publishers and suppliers now face stricter compliance requirements, budget constraints. As a result, supplying books to libraries has become more challenging despite improved procurement processes.

Manish: Procurement has become more transparent through e-tendering and GeM, but it has also become more complex due to lengthy procedures, compliance requirements, and delayed payments.

AABP: What improvements would you like to see in the book procurement process for government, institutional, and public libraries?

Rohit: The book procurement process should be faster. Budgets should be released on time, simplified tender procedures on platforms like GEM, quicker payment cycles, more emphasis should be done on quality content purchase rather than only the lowest prices would benefit both libraries and publishers. A stronger collaboration between libraries, publishers, and suppliers would also ensure better collection development.

Manish: Faster procurement cycles, timely budget utilization, simplified tender procedures, transparent title selection, and quicker payment to publishers and suppliers would greatly improve the system.

AABP: Do you believe Indian libraries are doing enough to promote reading among children and young adults? What more can be done?

Rohit: While many libraries are making commendable efforts, there is significant scope for improvement. Libraries should move beyond being book repositories and become community learning spaces by organizing reading clubs, author interactions, storytelling sessions. Stronger collaboration with libraries and publishers can help foster reading culture among children and young adults.

Manish: More needs to be done. Regular reading programmes, book clubs, author interactions, storytelling sessions, and partnerships with schools can significantly improve reading habits.

AABP: How can publishers and libraries collaborate more effectively to increase readership and encourage lifelong reading habits?

Rohit: As mentioned above by organizing reading clubs, author interactions, storytelling sessions, book launches. A stronger collaboration with libraries and publishers can help foster reading habits.

Manish: They should jointly organize author events, book exhibitions, reading campaigns, faculty recommendations, and provide affordable access to both print and digital collections.

AABP: How do you see the balance between print and digital collections evolving over the next decade?

Rohit: Over the next decade, libraries will increasingly adopt a hybrid model in which print and digital collections complement each other. Digital resources will expand rapidly, especially journals and research materials, due to their accessibility and convenience for research and remote learning. Print books, however, will remain important for deep reading and classroom use. The future lies in offering the right format for the right purpose.

Manish: A hybrid model will dominate. Digital collections will expand for research and remote access, while print books will continue to be essential for deep learning, reference, and long-term preservation.

AABP: What opportunities do digital lending platforms offer publishers, and what concerns remain around licensing, copyright, and discoverability?

Rohit: Digital lending platforms offer publishers new opportunities to expand readership, reach users in remote areas, generate recurring revenue for publishers through institutional licensing, and extend the life of their content. However, there are concerns around fair licensing models, copyright protection, piracy.

Manish: Digital lending increases accessibility and readership, but publishers require fair licensing models, stronger copyright protection, usage analytics, and better discoverability of their titles.

AABP: What steps could strengthen multilingual collections across the country?

Rohit: Indian-language publishing is still underrepresented in many library collections. Libraries can strengthen multilingual collections by allocating dedicated budgets for regional-language materials, adopting balanced acquisition policies, and collaborating with local publishers. These steps will help preserve India’s linguistic diversity and make libraries more inclusive and accessible.

Manish: Support is improving but remains uneven. Libraries should allocate dedicated budgets for regional-language books and actively promote local authors and multilingual collections.

AABP: Many countries position libraries as community hubs offering workshops, author events, maker spaces, and digital literacy programmes. Should Indian libraries move in a similar direction?

Rohit: Yes. Indian libraries should evolve into community hubs rather than remain solely book-lending institutions. By offering workshops, author interactions, reading clubs, libraries can attract diverse users, strengthen community engagement, and foster a stronger reading culture.

Manish: Yes. Libraries should become learning and community centres by offering workshops, career guidance, digital literacy, innovation spaces, and cultural programmes alongside traditional library services.

AABP: What policy changes or government initiatives would have the greatest positive impact on India’s library ecosystem?

Rohit: The greatest impact would come from increased and sustained funding, modernization of libraries, regular budget allocations for print and digital resources, and simplified procurement policies. All this could further strengthen India’s library ecosystem.

Manish: Higher and dedicated library budgets, timely procurement, implementation of NEP library recommendations, modernization of public libraries, stronger librarian training, and support for both print and digital resources would have the greatest impact.