How a Hyderabad organisation helped establish over 600 libraries in India

Hyderabad-based Food4Thought Foundation connects book donors with educational institutions and individuals to establish libraries across India. They have established 622 libraries so far and hope to establish 1000 libraries by 2025.

“We help connect idle books to hungry minds,” reads a statement on the website of Hyderabad-based Food4Thought Foundation (food4thoughtfoundation.org). Formed in 2015 as a bridge connecting individuals who want to donate books idling on their shelves and educational institutions and those seeking books to open a small library, the organisation has helped set up 622 libraries across India. Their goal is to establish 1001 libraries by 2025. “Initially, we were contacting people and telling them about the need for libraries. Today, we get nearly 20 inquiries daily,” says Madhavi, one of the co-founders and director.

The libraries they have helped set up are at government schools, hospitals, parks, gated communities, and even prisons. While cities such as Bengaluru and Hyderabad have been proactive, there has been increased interest from Northeastern States and Gujarat, says Madhavi. So far, the Foundation has helped set up 250 libraries in Bengaluru, 135 in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh and 55 in the Northeast. 

The Foundation’s multi-pronged activities include setting up and monitoring libraries, guiding teachers and volunteers for the upkeep of the library, cataloguing and barcoding the books to help donors track their books, encouraging reading habits through events such as reading Olympiads, storytelling sessions and quiz programmes, and building a digital catalogue of folk stories through podcasts.

When approached by individuals who want to donate their books, the Foundation asks for the titles. “If they are children’s storybooks, we accept them immediately since several government schools need them. If the books are more fiction or non-fiction for adults, we identify appropriate libraries. We also talk to individuals keen on opening small libraries and then accept the books,” Madhavi explains. The Foundation does not accept textbooks or religious books. 

Several requests come from schools in far-flung areas and the Foundation maps the students’ reading profile — level of ease with reading and languages — and then collates and ships 250 books. Madhavi explains, “We segregate books into levels one, two, three and four based on the reading difficulty. If the request is primarily for level one, we include 25 books from levels two and three so that at least some students will be motivated to go to the next level once they grasp the level one book.”

Small libraries have also been set up in outpatient departments of a few hospitals in Hyderabad, at the request of doctors. Libraries have also been set up at panchayat levels in villages, cafes in urban areas and a few prisons (Guwahati, Dibrugarh, Majuli and Nagaon). “If we know that someone will maintain the library, we help them set it up,” says Madhavi.

Setting up a library is only the initial step. For schools, a teacher is trained to maintain the library, encouraged to conduct two library classes per month and incentivised for the effort. On a dedicated app, the teacher logs in details of the library classes with audio and video recordings.