General Information About Us

In today's high-tech learning environment, the Library as a primary learning resource is the fulcrum of support for the entire range of activities in an educational campus. Therefore, it is an essential instrument of education to satisfy society's information needs.

B. K. Birla College has an excellent Central Library,perhaps the best among all College Libraries affiliated with the University of Mumbai. The B. K. Birla College Central Library, since its establishment in the year 1972, has been the nerve centre of the Institute determined to satisfy the diverse information needs of its users. Today with its finest infrastructure, rich collection and with the application of ICT, the Library has transformed itself into a hybrid automated system with digital knowledge resources and online services. Itplays a vital role in supporting teaching, learning and research activities and is a domain for information seekers, students, faculty, or researchers. The Library aims to help the academic community keep abreast with the latest developments in their area of activities and provide information support for research and consultancy. At the same time, for students, the Library is thefinest source to get assistance for information related to their course curriculum, project work, career and self-development.

The B. K. Birla College Central Library came into existence with the establishment of the college in Kalyan in 1972. During its starting days, the Library was located in the college's main building with a limited collection of 1824 books and 100 members. It was shifted to its new separate building of 6000 Sq.ft area in 1990. Today the B. K. Birla College is among the few colleges under the University of Mumbai, having a separate library building with a vast and refinedcollection of more than80,000 print bookscovering various fields of knowledge in humanities, social sciences, sciences and allied subjects. In addition, it has a distinct collection of more than 1200 Audio / Video Materials like CDs, DVDs and others.Moreover, it has a subscription to over 130print periodicals, including 70 research journals anda few popular magazines of general interest.

It can accommodate 200 users at a time and caters to the information needs of nearly 13000+ students, 250+ staff, and200+ external members.The library is provided with proper ventilation, lightning & fans.Besides this, the Library has set up departmental and classroom libraries through the [email protected] for a better user experience.

In 2022, under RUSA grants, additional reading space was created by transforming the old polyhouse into a green reading room with natural light and ventilation. This reading facilityis open till late at night and accommodates40 readers. In addition, the frontage and the area surrounding the Library are developed into a knowledge park with two gazebos for open reading, discussions, and other facilities. The Library started its automation in 2005 and currently operates in a fully automated environment with web-centric cloud-based Libsys10 Integrated Library Management Software. The Library provides a growing range of databases on the campus network. The Library provides access to numerous digital resources through the subscribed LS Discovery Services, Knimbus Digital Library platform, Informatics J-Gate e-journals database, India Business Insights and other open-access databases. In addition, the Library has introduced Mobile Technology based services and is focused on web-based electronicdelivery of information through social media channels and web portals.The Library is Wi-Fi enabled and has security systems with CCTV.

The Library is providing a growing range of databases on the campus network. Access to e-resources subscribed by the Library has also been provided for off-campus users. The Library has provided 'Web-Scale Discovery Service' (Single Window Search tool) to find relevant information across all Library subscribed web resources, open-access resources, library catalogue and MAHE digital repository using the single search box. All the library services have been automated on modern line using Koha software. The Library is enabled with RFID technology, Wi-Fi and security systems with CCTV.

The Library provides various research/project support services like access to Turnitin (plagiarism check) & Grammarly (online grammar and spelling checker). It organizes author workshops, literature search service, access to bibliographical and citation tools, i.e., Scopus and Web of Science. The Library has the best practices, including organizing information literacy programs, library conferences/workshops, general and subject books exhibitions, Librarians' Day & National Library Week celebrations. There is a separate audio-visual room, computer lab, group study area and private study area in the Library. The Library has all the facilities for the students to learn. The Health Sciences Library is committed to providing world-class information support to its users.