Three friends stand around a table covering brand new Asterix comic books with plastic. In the backdrop, a woman stands, wearing an apron, and painting a giraffe on the wall. The room smells of fresh paint and new collections of Amar Chitra Katha, Famous Five, Malory Towers, Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings line the walls. Yellow lamps hang from the ceiling, and colourful stools and mattresses wear an inviting look. The ground floor space that has been converted into a public library at Bandra's D'Monte Park Road is getting ready to lure children into cultivating the habit of reading.
The ground floor of Princess building had been reserved by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation for a public library and was given out on a 30-year lease to the Maharashtra Mitra Mandal in 2003. However, the library was not alive and kicking. One day, 47-year-old French teacher Vibha Kamat, who lives in the vicinity, saw the library board and entered. "It had always been my dream to open a library. I had been looking around the area for space: I checked garages, bungalows, but didn't get anything. I used to see this place every time I passed by, so I decided to inquire," she said. At the time, there was only a shelf half-filled with books. Soon, she and two of her friends got together and decided to help revamp the library. Read More
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