Telangana archaeology department to revive rare books

Hyderabad: The state archaeology department has finally woken up to the issue of decaying of thousands of rare books in its possession and has decided to digitise them and take conservation measures.

The department’s library is a treasure trove of around 26,000 books acquired over more than 100 years since it was established by the seventh Nizam Mir Osman Ali Khan in 1914.

Many of these books were either published by the department or acquired from elsewhere and are now out of print.

Some outstanding rare books at the library include a 14th Century Quran handwritten by Mughal emperor Aurangzeb and a book published by the department in its early days containing handmade renderings of the Ajanta cave paintings.

The Ajanta caves, which are now a world heritage site, were once under the protection of the Nizam and the then government had brought in experts from Europe for the conversation of the paintings.

Archaeology department director N.R. Visalatchy said, “We do not want to just ensure that the books are safe but also make them available to anyone who is interested in reading them. Because these books are very rare, research scholars from various universities visit our library to refer them. However, the pages are becoming brittle".

"So a decision was taken to digitise all the rare books and make them available in the form of a digital library. A library will also be set up for such books with climate controlled conditions so that they can be conserved in the original form", Visalatchy added.