Where have we gone wrong? Are our ‘Five Laws’ intact upon which we had built our edifice, our industry in the present day connotation?   The question that probes the mind of an information specialist is are we reader centric or user centric?  Where are my readers or am I left alone with an array of customers who pays for my services. Will the technology with its new style of operation make us an extinct species?  These are some doubts that have given sleepless nights to many information professionals.  I feel it is justifiable on my part  to mention this in the beginning for the status of information centers and  professionals is more less the same all over the world.  I have made this statement after browsing through articles regarding the status of  our professional colleagues all over the world though I would like to make a small attempt of the prevailing scenario in this state- Goa. I would not like to make tall claims of my knowledge about the existing conditions.  Yet as a librarian who has worked at grass root  level in one of the leading schools in Goa and as one of the disheartened persons  who made attempts to enlighten the authorities of its lackadaisical attitude towards the profession  I would like to put my  observations with all my sincerity.

The traditional mode of operation (Catalogue cards) makes the user a bit apprehensive.  It becomes inevitable for a user to have an orientation into the area of librarianship to extract the full potential of a collection.  A catalogue framed in terms of a cataloguev code – a glaring misconception of the very function of a library.  Technology has given the reader to pull in more information..  On the other hand the classic style of functioning has shocked the library personnel with the question Where are my readers?.  The answer is your readers have multiplied in numbers and  the user is invisible with the change in formats and the way information is packed. He either reads or buys his information in seconds with the simple click of a mouse. The traditional style of a reader with his book a library personnel few cupboards containing books with fusty smell has disappeared,.    Libraries are data centers and the librarians content managers.

To the question where have we librarians particularly in the state of Goa  failed the answer seems to be a bit complex if I may say so.  On a survey taken few years ago(Iam sure there cannot much change) there are nearly 75 Higher secondary Schools and------- schools.  At the grass root level or at the elementary level of education, the principle “catch them young’ the children have frustrating experience.  Reading is a culture that needs proper channelisation by trained personnel’s like any other profession.  The careless attitude of educational authorities their insensitiveness to logic and reasoning is  beyond comprehension. Ill ventilated rooms at times corridors serve as centers of information.  The system considers  library as an activity which could be handled by people who are under worked in terms of number of working hours.  The mode of  getting them ito reading  is such harrowing experience any child with proper frame mind would rather prefer to skip those days allotted to them.

The authorities refuse to paly  fair game with those who have the expertise.

On the other hand  library professionals are either  very apprehensive or overwhelmed.On one hand as the profession is progressing  in leaps technologically the professionals are unequipped with less communicative skills and more theory centric.  The only solution is to make the entry  more rigid and will attract people of quality.  Also the library schools need to prevail on educational authorities to make a drastic change in the system so that the state can benefit out of a area which cannot be done away with. .