A retired professor couple from Nadia’s Kalyani donated around 2,000 books from their personal collection to Kalyani University where they taught for about three decades.

Couple Kalyanishankar Ghatak and Keka Ghatak, who retired from the varsity’s Bengali department, formally handed over the books to the university authorities for the benefit of students. The Ghataks chose Monday for the handover as a tribute to Rabindranath Tagore on his 161st birth anniversary.

Their books include those in Bengali, English, and Urdu. There are also articles and journals spanning several genres and languages.

The couple said they had around 4,000 books and would donate another lot of books after cataloguing. They also intend to donate some racks and shelves for the departmental library for use by students studying Bengali literature.

“We handed over half of our collection. We plan to donate more for students,” Kalyanishankar told The Telegraph and added the donation included books like Sisir Kumar De’s Growth and Development of Vaishnabism and Ramesh Chandra Majumdar’s The History of Bengal.

Sources at the university said a few weeks ago the couple expressed their wish to donate the books to head of Bengali department Prabir Pramanik and senior professor Sukhen Biswas.

The two teachers spoke to vice-chancellor Manas Kumar Sanyal for his formal nod.

Pramanik said: “Their wish was unique. It shows how the two teachers even after years of retirement remain concerned about students.”

Kalyanishankar retired in 2008 after teaching at the Bengali department for 28 years. Keka taught at the department for 32 years before retiring in 2016.

“These books were our precious collection of life. We lived with these books. But since we are growing old, we wanted their preservation and use. What better way than to let students use them and what better day to donate them than today (Tagore’s birth anniversary),” said Keka.