Abstract

The objective of this paper is to find out the rationale for institutional repository (IR) categories and the challenges in sustainable development of open scholarship to facilitate scholarly communication. This is a critical study method adopted to find out the categories of IR and various developmental challenges with the aid of related literature. IR categories and their nomenclature are found to be overlapping when used by repository registries and librarians alike. As the digital objects in the repositories are expanding, with a requirement to store new entities as diverse as linked data and web archives, IR categorisation becomes difficult to determine. Even though the growth of IRs in India is phenomenal, concerted research and development efforts to strengthen digital infrastructure and repository solutions in multilingual settings are slow. With the rapid growth of IRs worldwide, the categories with which these are classified is examined. As a contentious player in scholarly communication process, the challenges of IRs’ development are underlined. The prospects and deployment of IRs requires funding and an appropriately skilled workforce, along with government support. This is viewed from global and Indian perspectives.