It is a real challenge  before the Librarians to  enhance the service quality  in order to fulfill the ever increasing  aspirations of the  readers of libraries. As a result of  limitations of funds and also  cutback funds problems crop up  in maintaining libraries.  Specially in these circumstances librarians of academic libraries are facing  grave difficulties.  To keep up the  existing  services and  to introduce  new services  as well as to  maximizing  the  requirements of the  readers,  there is an impact of these cutback funds.  Under these  circumstances,  through   getting feedbacks of readers,  it is possible to  remove the unnecessary services and include or introduce   new services. Service quality models   which are utilized by  Library Science Researchers  can be used  for this purpose.   It appears in  literature analyzing service quality models have been utilized which are introduced by  people such as  Parasuraman and  Tailor.

When we look at the  researches done  in the field of  University libraries in Sri Lanka,  it is apparent that   researches are very few.  In comparison with the other countries,  it appears as there is no researches   with regard to service quality.  In literature reviews, information    could  be found of   two researches  conducted  in Sri Lankan universities  on service quality.  One such  research  has been conducted by Library users of  the Science faculty of  the   Colombo University to measure the service quality status.  The other research  has been conducted only using  students of  four Art faculties of University of Sri Lanka.   These two researches  anticipated  to measure the  service quality of  libraries.  In these two researches  Parasuram’s Servqual model has been used.

For this research  students of  ten universities,  Post graduates, and  academic  staff  have been engaged.  It  is  intended to  comparatively review the  service quality  and user satisfaction in these  researches. This is the first research  conducted  in the field of libraries  in Sri Lanka. In literature analysis  directly similar to the subject similar  researches  cannot be found  even in other countries.

When looking at the Universities of Sri Lanka,  it is apparent that it is not progressive.  It has not up to the  constantly  progressing  advanced technology.  There is no accepted methodology to  measure  service quality and user satisfaction.  Yet  it is emphasized  in workshops, conferences and researches  that  there is a  necessity of such a methodology.  This necessity has been realized by the  officials of the University Grant Commission.  University Grant Commission has initiated a Quality Assurance Unit in 2008  for analyzing of Service quality  in  libraries.  Prior to  quality inspection  by the relevant unit   through  conferences and discussions  awareness programs were conducted for the  Administrative Officers of the universities.  It is intended to carry out this task intermittently.

This research    has been conducted  by collecting data from  readers  on  all services in  Universities of Sri Lanka and  they are divided  mainly into  four dimensions and  under them to  60 attributes. Through this,  it can be realized that  the  status of  service  quality and user satisfaction of the   contemporary  libraries. More over  through this  background  has been prepared for  future research activities  in Universities. These findings will be helpful to  libraries and stakeholders to improve  their current situation of the academic  libraries in Sri Lanka  further more.