Terms of use

What this is

Mana Jardin Children's Library is a free lending library for children who live in Mana Jardin, run by volunteers from the same corridors. Membership is free, borrowing is free, and there is nothing to buy anywhere on this site.

The books belong to the library and are lent, never sold.

Who can join

Children who live in this building, whether their family owns their flat or rents it. A guardian fills in the form; the library does not sign a child up on the word of another child.

Any reader may borrow any book, whatever their age. The age shown on a book is a suggestion about who it was written for, not a rule about who may take it home.

Borrowing

A librarian decides what goes home and when. Asking for a book on this site is a request, not a booking — the shelf may say a book is available and a librarian may still have promised it to somebody standing in front of them.

Please bring books back by the date on your own page so the next reader can have them, and look after them while you have them. If a book is damaged or lost, tell a librarian. Accidents happen and nobody will be cross.

Giving a book

Donating a book is entirely optional and is never a condition of joining or of borrowing. Donors are thanked by name, by flat, or not at all — whichever they chose when they gave the book.

The library keeps no leaderboard of who has given the most, and never will.

Writing about a book

Readers can rate a book they have borrowed and add a few words about it. A librarian reads every review before it appears, and a published review shows the reader's first name only.

Please write about the book rather than about another person. A review that names another child, gives away where somebody lives, or is unkind will not be published.

Your account

Your password is yours. Do not share it, and do not sign in as somebody else. If you think another person knows it, change it and tell a librarian.

Always sign out on a shared device in the library room.

The library can suspend or close an account — for example when a reader grows out of the library or a family leaves. Nothing is deleted when that happens; see the privacy notice.

The AI Librarian

The AI Librarian is a computer, and computers get things wrong. It is there to help a child pick a book and answer a passing curiosity — not to do homework, and not to replace the librarian in the room.

It talks about books and nothing else. It never decides what a child may borrow.

This site

The library runs this site as best it can, in evenings and at weekends. It may be unavailable sometimes, and a book shown as available may already be in somebody's bag.

If something on this site is wrong, tell us and we will fix it.

What we can and cannot promise

This is a free library run by volunteers, using software written by one person in his own time. Nothing here is sold and nothing is charged for, so there is no service anybody has bought and no guarantee that the site will be working when you want it.

The site is offered as it is. To the fullest extent the law allows, neither the library nor the person who wrote the software is liable for any indirect or consequential loss arising from using it, and where liability cannot lawfully be excluded it is limited to one thousand Indian rupees (₹1,000). Nothing here limits liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, or for anything else Indian law does not allow to be excluded.

None of that changes how the library behaves. If something goes wrong with a child's record, tell a librarian and it will be put right.

Which law applies

These terms are governed by the laws of India, and the courts at Bengaluru, Karnataka have jurisdiction over any dispute arising out of them.

If any part of this page turns out to be unenforceable, the rest still applies.