Bhopal: The Madhya Pradesh Government on Monday signed a Memorandum Of Understanding (MoU) with the British Council to facilitate the smooth transition of the now-closed British Library to the newly-formed Swami Vivekanand Library.

According to the MoU, the British Council has agreed to donate all the books, DVDs, CDs and the entire furniture to the new library and provide free training and consultancy to the new set up for one year.

The British Library closed its operations in the state capital on March 31, stating it was shifting focus to education and new projects with the involvement of the United Kingdom Education Research Institute. "The closure was part of its global restructuring and the changing nature of its work in India," a Library spokesman had then said.

The closure of the British library caused heartburn to its thousands of members following which over 5,000 members carried out a month-long campaign signing a petition asking the British Council authorities to rescind the decision. They even launched a blog to get support.

However, after a month of its closure, the Bharatiya Janata Party regime in the state agreed to run the library. The lease of the building was transferred to the state's education department on the directives of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.

The chief minister also sanctioned Rs.10 million for the library so that there was no problem in running it. "The government also wants to retain its staff and members," an education department official said.

"Former staff members of the British Library have been hired to run the operations of the library which will be formally opened for the members on June 25 (Wednesday)," said P.R. Tiwari, secretary, Vivekanand Library.

The British Library here served as a haven for book lovers of the city for nearly four decades. It was opened on May 14, 1965, with nearly 30,000 books from the local Kala Parishad and at the time of closure had the finest collection of books, periodicals and newspapers in the state.

It was the only state-of-the-art library equipped with books covering a variety of subjects.

Madan Mohan Upadhyay, Principal Secretary, School Education Department, signed the MoU on behalf of Madhya Pradesh government. Rod Pryde, director, British Council of India represented the council. IANS