India, March 24 -- While the recent Marathi literary conference in New Delhi attracted participation from top politicians in the state, most students and residents of rural Maharashtra lack access to public libraries, shows information obtained through the Right to Information (RTI) Act by activist Abhay Kolarkar.

Out of 44,738 villages in the state, at least 33,588 villages do not have a single government-subsidised library, as per data provided by the Directorate of Libraries in response to Kolarkar's application. At least 1,000 public libraries have shut down in the past three years and only 127 out of the state's 27,951 gram panchayats have libraries within their premises, the data shows.

"Promoting book culture is not a priority fo...