Launch Of Zomi Online Library Welcomed
In a new move to ‘bridge’ geographical distances and encourage the Chin people worldwide to share the resources, the Zomi Online Library was launched on 15 May 2009 with about 300 collected items in a total of 8 categories.
Initiated in 2008 by a group of ZONET (Zomi International Network) moderators, the Internet library designed to be free and downloadable to all visitors has now got a collection of materials including articles, journals, theses, photos and books, mainly related to the Chin people.
President of Zomi Innkuan UK, Lian Tawng, commented this is a step forward that leads us into a better world in terms of communication and information for all our people inside Burma and abroad and that each one of us has a chance to equip ourselves with a duty for its future improvement by contributing and collaborating in any possible way so that this can become a good centre of resources for all of us.
Van Cung Lian, Civil Engineer in the UK, remarked the website is awesome and useful, adding a request for the future collection to include Chin army history such as their sacrifices during the Anglo-and-Japanese wars and more materials in other Chin dialects to have a wider readership.
Another web user identified as kamlian wrote ‘good and great jobs’ about the site.
Australia-based Project leader, Paul Khaipu, told Chinland Guardian: “We are happy to be able to launch the site after so many testings and trial periods for about a year. Our main purpose is to collect as much as possible resources of topics related to all our people including Kuki, Chin, Mizo, Zomi in India and Burma as well as other useful resources, and to promote the name and the Chin/Zomi people to the cyberworld through having more reliable websites enriched with resources for the outsiders to learn more about us.”
“We would like to say thanks to you all those who encourage and support the project. We expect and invite all our people to keep supporting us by contributing any resources to the project,” added the team leader-cum-webmaster.
The library, believed to be the first in its kind among the Chin people, is funded and hosted by Zomi Domains and Web Hosting. Its database has been built up and compiled mostly with contributions by individuals and collections from other websites, according to the project team.
