Jumbo Editorial Team
The improvement and strengthening of the Sindh Archives have earned laurels for the provincial government. Team leaders, directors and coordinators worked hard for accomplishing the arduous task of providing accessibility to the rich treasures of information.
They have made the precious resource material accessible to researchers of history, culture, archaeology, police, political science, language and literature besides other disciplines.
Mahboob Ali of the IT department supervised the development of software for archival record information retrieval system after Prof Dr Nasim Fatima had laid the foundation by preparing the software manual upon the request of the Director.
She supervised the Finding Aid Section and during the last six years she prepared 35 Finding Aids in the forms of index, bibliography, catalogues of special materials and of half a dozen personal collections.
A former Chairperson of the Library & Information Science department of the University of Karachi, she also prepared union list and news clips index besides having supervised a PhD thesis on Sindh Archives by Shamshad Ahmad which was published from Germany.
Prof Dr Nasim Fatima authored a number of research oriented introductions on Finding Aids, some of which were published in the HEC approved journals.
She has spearheaded the team which prepared the catalogue of the Sindh Archives Reference Library of about 36,000 books, maps and journals alongwith personal collections of Mumtaz Bhutto, Dr N B G Qazi, Pir Ali Mohammad Rashidi, Dr Nabi Bux Khan Baloch, Sharif-ul-Mujahid, Khalid Shamsul Hasan and a few others.
The archival record volumes data and contents of 43 files were also bound during Roshan Ali Kanasro’s tenure as Director of the Sindh Archives who was also credited to have shifted the library and IT department in a new building with the old one undergoing a process of renovation.
The Chief Librarian suggests that more library and information scientists are needed to render library services successfully.
Prof Dr Nasim Fatima has proposed that a bank of letters of dignitaries be established as a museum in library and a periodical section with online index deemed essential.
The project of Sindh Archives is indeed a successful one, having given a new lease of life to the precious documents of the yesteryears which have been preserved for lifetime. The Sindh Archives was established as a full-fledged entity in 1988.
It was boosted by Abdul Hamid Akhund while serving as Secretary Culture to the Government of Sindh in the 1990s and during this period it was shifted to its present premises in Clifton, in close vicinity of the Federation House.
The Chief Librarian suggests that more library and information scientists are needed to render library services successfully.
ReplyDeleteLibrary Software India