I am greatly indebted, and wish to express my sincere gratitude to Mrs. Renu Arora, Scientist E-I, Education and Training Division, INSDOC, New Delhi for her generous help and expert advice in carrying out this study. Her valuable suggestions and guidance encouraged me constantly through out the preparation of this dissertation work.

I am grateful to Mr. V.K.Gupta, Associate Head, ETTG, INSDOC, New Delhi and faculty members- Mrs. C.M.Anand, Mrs.Rekha Mittal, Mr. N.K. Choudhary, Ms. V.V. Laxmi-and all other staff of Education and Training Division for providing expert training through lectures and practicals in information field which gave me enough confidence to undertake this kind of study.

My hearty thanks are also due to Prof.T Vishwanathan, former Director, INSDOC, New Delhi and Mr.M.K.Pund for their valuable lectures, however very few in number, in technicalities of Library Networking, during AIS course, which in turn helped me to prepare technical details while carrying out the dissertation work.

My special thanks are to respected Prof.(Mrs.) Neerja Shukla, Head, Deptt.of Education of Groups with Special Needs (DEGSN), NCERT, New Delhi for her kind and emotional support in the critical hours.

Finally, I thank all my friends and colleagues for discussions and suggestions in different stages of the work, which led to substantial improvement in the work.

Pawan Kumar Jha

New Delhi  

16 October, 2001