#Ajayan |

School days, though once filled with the daunting grind of textbooks and relentless memorization, often become cherished memories, rich with nostalgia. Those old once dreaded textbooks were actually treasure troves of knowledge, laying the very foundation of life as we know it now. In a homage to the past, these classic school books are getting a new lease on life in the digital world. Thanks to WikiGranthasala's ambitious project, Pallikootam, these timeless educational resources will soon be available for free online, allowing a new generation to access the wisdom of yesterdays in the most modern of way.

Numerous efforts have aimed to scan and make old textbooks accessible online, but Pallikootam - launched on November 1 and running for two months - takes this a step further by digitally transcribing the books, ensuring they’re not only preserved but also easily readable. This unique initiative is led by Akhil Krishnan S, an IT engineer whose passion for digitization has driven him to spearhead this mission, creating a lasting digital archive of educational heritage.

Tony Antony, a retired principal with an impressive collection of century-old textbooks, has joined the Pallikootam project. In his chat with Metro Vaartha, he shared that the COVID-19 pandemic inspired him to venture into digitization. He was associated with Granthapura, initiated by Shiju Alex. Some of the Grade IV Malayalam textbooks from the early 20th century, he remarked, are astonishingly advanced, with content quality that rivals modern-day Plus 1 and Plus 2 grade texts.

Though the academic standard has been adjusted for today’s curriculum, much of the original content endures - the classic fables and moral tales are still there, but with a modern twist.

As an experienced mentor to educators, he believes that imposing overly challenging texts on students is unnecessary. He points out that while literacy rates have soared from around 15 per cent in the 1920s to nearly 100 per cent today, the proportion of individuals deeply interested in language and literature remains similar - about 15 per cent. The key difference, and a heartening one, is that today, everyone has the foundational ability to read and write the language.

Akhil explains that the initial effort to digitize these texts began with Shiju Alex, who scanned and shared them as PDFs on Granthapura. The new approach, using Shiju’s material goes further by using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology, which extracts text from the scanned images and converts it into editable, searchable text, making these old books even more accessible and user-friendly.

This is only the beginning. Depending on the response and active participation of the public, even more textbooks could be digitized. The two-month-long endeavour may see some 15-20 books made available in WikiGranthasala, a digital sanctuary for Malayalam works that have slipped beyond the bounds of copyright.

Akhil notes that many of these old textbooks are rich historical resources. For example, an 1878 geography textbook from Travancore reveals the sources of some rivers from dense forests, which are now plantation areas. It even records the old name of the Achankovil river as "Kulakkadayaar", offering a glimpse into the evolving landscape and heritage of regions.

A snapshot of the unique perspective on the economic priorities of the time can be gathered from the century-old Travancore Atlas. It reveals intriguing details about the region’s historical trade, noting that tea was once the main export of the State, while paddy led the list of imports.

The 1963 music textbook remains a highly regarded authority on Carnatic music to this day, continuing to be a valuable resource for learners and practitioners alike. Similarly, an old textbook on Kathakali stands as a definitive work on the art form, still serving as an essential reference book. There was even a textbook dedicated to agriculture, highlighting how education in those days integrated practical knowledge directly into learning.

A 1952 text book detailing terms in mathematics has a unique linguistic style. "Maximum" is referred to as mahistam, "polynomial" is called kritipadam, and "permutation" is described as prastaravam.

The relentless floods since the catastrophic one of 2018 have swept away countless old treasures, fragile relics of knowledge and history lost to the waters. This initiative is a call to preserve these priceless artifacts for posterity, for within these pages lies history itself. "These old textbooks hold the echoes of the past, beliefs, values and teachings, the rights or the wrongs that have guided us to where we are now," says Akhil.