Auteur Satyajit Ray’s Kheror Khata (red books or manuscripts), where he jotted down minute details associated with his films, are now being made available by National Digital Library of India on your phones or tablets through an Android app.

NDL is sponsored by Ministry of Human Resource Development and coordinated by Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur. Unveiled in February, the Android app has got more than 50,000 downloads, according to the library’s chief technical officer Nand Gopal Chattopadhyay.

‘We are working on the iOS app for Apple devices. It will be launched in a month or so. To date more than 70 lakh items including books, research papers, videos, manuscripts, etc., were uploaded on NDL. The target for 2017 is at least two crore items,’ Chattopadhyay said. All these resources are easily accessible through the app as well, he said.

Of the 70 lakh resources, Ray’s manuscripts are one of the most important items hosted by the digital repository, said Chattopadhyay. ‘One can access as many as 37 of Ray’s red books in the library. These manuscripts comprise handwritten notes, scripts, dialogues, scribbles, costume designs... all associated with his films,’ the official said.

Meanwhile, the institute is working on integrating NDL with World Health Organisation’s database. ‘We are working on integrating WHO database which has little less than one crore items such as books and clinical trial data as well as scientific publications. This will be launched in 2017 itself,’ he said.

‘In addition, we have already linked PubMed Central which is a free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature.’ he added.Courtesy The Hindu