PANAJI
The State government on Monday informed the Bombay High Court at Goa that 80 per cent of the work to change the non-functional air conditioners at Panaji’s Central Library is completed. The government has missed its deadline of February 28 to replace the ACs.
The High Court had taken suo motu cognizance of multiple news reports that brought to light how the ACs of the Central Library have not been working since the year 2019, posing a threat to the more than 40,000 rare books and documents that lie within the Library.
During the hearing in January, the government had told the Court that the ACs would be replaced by February 28.
When the matter came up for hearing on Monday, the Advocate General Devidas Pangam told the Court that 80 per cent of the work of replacing the ACs is completed.
The Court had earlier noted, “prima facie there may be issues of breaches of public duties that the government and its agencies are expected to discharge under the provisions of the Goa Public Libraries Act, 1993, and the rules made thereunder”.
“We are concerned with the treasure house of almost 40,000 volumes of the pre-liberation collection of books in this state’s library. Besides, there are rare and invaluable manuscripts, which need to be cared for scientifically and sensitively,” the Court had said.
