Ratna Nidhi Trust organises Mission Million Books in Mumbai

Dr. Swaroop Sampath at the Mission Million Books event

Ratna Nidhi Trust, a disability and education-centric not for profit organisation based out of Mumbai undertook the world's largest book donation drive "Mission Million Books" in Mumbai today. The event took place on 22nd April 2018 and marked the 4th book donation drive, under the aegis of the #MissionMillionBooks campaign. This was preceded by similar events in 2016 and 2017 in Satara, Baramati and Mumbai.

Inaugurating the exhibition, Dr. Swaroop Sampat Rawal, member Governing Council, Maharashtra International Education Board said, " Education is a priority for Maharashtra and for India. Even in this digital age, I seriously like to read books and believe that they have an important role to play. All the children here must know that books take you into a wonderful world of imagination, enhance your creativity. Make sure you read beyond your school books."

With respect to this charitable act, impact of this drive's success Vinay Bhartia, Senior Vice President, Alibaba.com said, "They say reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. It's a pity that many deserving and curious children and youth in our country do not even have access to good quality reading material. This very thought led us to conceptualise the Mission Million Books initiative. Our endeavour is to provide good quality reading material to as many youngsters in the country as possible. In a short span, now over 700,000 books have been collected and donated impacting close to 2.5 million students across more than 2000 institutes in India. We are grateful to everyone for supporting us on this journey." Rajiv Mehta, Trustee, Ratna Nidhi Trust added, "We are receiving donations now at the rate of 500-1000 books per day and hope to cross the million mark possibly in 2018. We are grateful to all our partners. In this 4th edition, we are really happy that we have been able to provide bags and transport to the books as well."

Over 1000 principals were in attendance at the event. Prof B Ravi added, " The looks on the faces of the principals as they're collecting books is priceless." The books are in subjects such as Physics, Chemistry, Maths, Computers, Geography, History, Dictionaries, Encyclopaedias, Fictions, Biography, Business & Management, Story books, Mythology, Children books, Humanity & religion, Magazine etc. in the form of donation.

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