The burning of the Jaffna Public Library by an organized mob of Sinhalese individuals took place on the night of 31 May 1981. The library's burning was one of the most violent examples of ethnically motivated biblioclasm of the 20th century. At the time of its destruction, the library was one of the biggest in Asia, containing over 97,000 books and manuscripts. Sri Lankan Government rebuilt the burnt library and restarted its collection.