Role of LIS Professionals to provide authentic information sources during COVID-19 a Pandemic crisis

During the national crisis, caused by a novel pandemic such as COVID-19 virus infections, people need authentic information to face such a virus. Libraries need to come forward in such a situation as primary sources of trustworthy information by providing rapid and easy access to those seeking authentic information sources. In this crisis, giving Remote Access, Virtual Library, e-resources, Ask the Librarian reference services to the user in real-time and at scale for a range of scientific- and policy-related responses can be very significant to the academic and research community. The present study has collected data from authentic information sources, mainly Government official portals of Indian states such as the MyGov COVID-19, UTs, and National/International agencies, etc. After analyzing and studying the data, the authentic information sources served to the research community are listed out. This paper also highlights the ratio of COVID-19 publications and highly cited publication of the same, using the Scopus abstracting databases. This study is an original research work focused on the roles and responsibilities and actions taken by the Library and librarians in crisis situations. Hence this study will help Librarians, Information Providers, Practitioners, Policy Makers, Researchers, and development activity in this field