BRITISH COUNCIL
WHILE the British Council has been fighting its corner to remain in Russia, elsewhere in the world it seems only too willing to shut up shop. In India the council announced last month that it was closing the libraries it runs in Thiruvananthapuram and Bhopal. The decision came as a complete shock to library staff and the Indian Medical Association described the potential loss of the library’s collection of books and journals as “a major blow” to medical students. The Kerala state government is trying to find a way to keep the library open in Thiruvananthapuram and has said it is prepared to run the library itself, if the British Council will just agree to leave behind its books and equipment.
The council says it “is changing the nature of its work” in the region and instead of the library, it would be sending Education UK councillors “to hold public seminars in popular venues” in Bhopal, Indore and Thiruvananthapuram. The role of Education UK is to attract international students (and their fees) to British universities, so these seminars will be recruitment exercises, not educational events. Meanwhile in Malaysia, the council told readers that the last date to borrow books from its library in Kuala Lumpur was 15 April, claiming that it is no longer needed because residents of the Klang Valley have wide access to information via other libraries and bookstores “as well as the internet”. Not to worry though, the council reassured, it will continue to “provide useful reading materials on UK universities” and tourist information about Britain at their offices.
All this follows the closure of offices in Nigeria (see Eye 1120) and the bizarre move into a reality TV scholarship contest in Ghana (Eye 1196). The British Council continues to declare that its purpose is to win friends for the UK abroad and that its “conviction that cultural relations can help individuals and the world community to thrive, [makes] the British Council a good partner”. But it is becoming increasingly clear its main aim is to sign up lucrative foreign students for UK universities.
Note:'Private Eye' is a is a British satirical magazine-newspaper which is on sale in supermarkets all over Britain and read by most journalists and politicians.
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