Punjab Public Library, Lahore, was established by order No. 2798 dated 8 November 1884 of the lieutenant governor of the Punjab, in the Home General Department. It has been registered under the Societies Registration Act of 1860.
The library began operations in the Baradari Wazir Khan, an imperial building of great historical importance built by Nawab Wazir Khan, the governor of Lahore, during Emperor Shahjahan’s reign with the assistance of the government of the Punjab. Its main purpose is to be a public library and reading room for use by all classes of people without discrimination as to religion, sex, race or creed.
Other library blocks were built in 1939, and a block housing the auditorium and Bait-ul-Quran section was constructed in 1968 and inaugurated by General Mohammad Musa, then governor of West Pakistan.
The Punjab Public Library, Lahore, lies in the heart of the city of Lahore at Library Road near the Lahore museum, off Shahrah-e-Quaid-e-Azam. It is surrounded by well known educational institutions and the Punjab University (Old Campus). The commercial centre of Anarkali, the main offices of the Metropolitan Corporation Lahore (Town Hall) and the provincial government offices, i.e., the Civil Secretariat, are a short distance from this building. Thus the Punjab Public Library, Lahore, is centrally situated; it has a congenial atmosphere for quiet and peaceful study.
The Punjab Public Library, Lahore, holds a rare collection of books in all fields of knowledge in English, Urdu, Persian, Arabic and Punjabi. Its total collection is about 0.3 million volumes and includes books, bound volumes of back numbers of magazines/ newspapers, reports, the old gazettes of Punjab, Pakistan and undivided India, and more than 1500 manuscripts. The library receives 170 magazines, 24 journals by subscription and the rest as complimentary copies. 12 dailies are received in the library