District Library kapurthala

Origin

Kapurthala was founded in 11^th century by Rana Kapur, from the ruling house of Jaisalmer (Rajashan). The present royal family of Kapurthala is descended from Nawab Jassa Singh Ahluwalia, a contemporary of Nadir Shah and Ahmad Shah. Many magnificent buildings were built during that period.

District Library was established in 1971. There is an interesting history behind the birth of this library. There was a very rare case of communal dispute among Hindus and Sikhs over a peice of land that both communities claimed belonged to them and wanted to construct their place of worship there. The matter got so serious that there were clashes and the local administration had to impose curfew to contain the situation. But at that time some good samaritans got together and came up with a brilliant idea. They decided to construct a library at the place of dispute. So, the library was born. Now the decision was acceptable to both the communities (though after a little initial hesitation). This solved the problem permanently. The library was named after the Ist Sikh Guru, Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji, who is respected as much by the Hindus as by the Sikhs. Guru Nanak Dev District Library is lighting the lives of the local people through the light of knowledge without any distinction of caste and creed.

Building

The decision of constructing the library was taken in haste due to the prevailaing situation at that time. It is said that the design of the building was imported from abroad. So, it was based on a design prepared by some western architect. The design is that of a well planned library. But who the designer was, is not known. At that time the decisions might have been taken in such a haste that recording such details was not given enough priority. Only one other library has such a well planned building in Punjab and that is District Library, Jalandhar. Both the designs are excelent but are very different from each other. The Jalandhar library is circular in shape but Kapurthala library is rectangular.

The library has two floors. The entrance to the ground floor is from East. On entering the building one comes across the Verandah. On the right is the Librarian's Room and the Children Section. Straight in front is Stack Room with Issue Desk. On left of this is the Reading Room accessible through Verandah. At the back of the Reading Room is the Reference Section accesible through the Stack Room.

The Ist floor is accesible through stairs from the the Stack Room on the Ground Floor. Now the Ist floor has been designed in a way similar to the Jalandhar Library building. Only difference is that here its rectangular and not round. An attick runs all round the length and breadth of the Stack Room on the ground floor. Book racks have been arranged on this attick in such a way that the person sitting at the Circulation Desk can view all the movements going on in the stack area above him/her. An store has also been provided on the first floor.

Location

Kapurthala is located at distance of 365 Kms from natinal capital Delhi and 115 Kms from state capital Chandigarh.

The library is located some distance away from the Bus Stand on the Sultanpur Lodhi Road, Opposite Jagjeet Cinema.

Staff

Collection

The library has a total collection of 38,000 documents. The library also subscribes following Newspapers/Magazines:

Membership

The library has a total of 2850 registered members till date.

Contact

Guru Nanak District Library,
Sultan Pur Lodhi Road,
Opposite Jagjeet Cinema,
Kapurthala -144601.
INDIA.