Dubai: Despite last year being the ‘Year of Reading,’ a 12 year-old Indian boy is continuing to encourage his community to embrace the culture of reading by putting up bookshelves in service stores in his community and around Dubai.
Eighth grader Ahan Kalra Mathur said he has placed bookshelves in seven different locations, some of which include hair salons, coffee shops, and health and dental clinics.
The shelves, which are filled with a variety of books, aim to encourage people to pick up a book and read while waiting for a service to be completed.
Mathur, who first presented the initiative as a school project, decided to continue working on it during his summer holidays by expanding his activities in his community — the Green Community.
“I was waiting to get my hair cut with my dad, and I was on my phone on social media when my mum said to switch it off and read a book. I told her there weren’t any books available at the salon and this is where the idea came from,” he told Gulf News.
Mathur pointed out he received positive feedback from different stores, and is planning to expand his initiative to hotels in Dubai and hopefully the Dubai Metro.
“The idea is that one could take or read a book from the shelf and return the book or replace it with another. There is no monitoring, books are just made available, making reading easy,” said Dipika Kalra, Mathur’s mother.
Encouraging her son to do good in his community, Kalra said she will continue to support Mathur by reaching out to different outlets and stores around the city.
