There is a festive spirit abroad on the campus of Mumbai’s oldest liberal arts college- Wilson College, Mumbai- as it celebrates the 200th birth anniversary of its eponymous founder during the current academic year In the heart of Mumbai’s upscale Marine Drive and fringing its famous Chowpatty sea face, stands the gothic brown and white stone building of Wilson College (estb. 1832), one of the oldest institutions of higher education in the country. Right now there’s a festive spirit in the college as it celebrates the 200th birth anniversary of its founder, Rev. Dr. John Wilson (1804-1875). To mark the occasion, the Wilson College management has organised a host of functions through the current academic year, starting with the release by Maharashtra governor S.M. Krishna on April 28 of Vision and Beyond, a commemorative volume published in honour of Wilson. “This volume has been planned as a tribute to Dr. Wilson’s life and contribution and will help us understand his legacy as we move forward in the 21st century. Wilson College has a great legacy of liberalism, commitment and a willingness to reach out to members of the larger community. The members of the bicentennial celebrations committee, as well as members of the commemorative volume committee have taken great pains in putting together a compendium which connects the past with the future,” says Dr. V.J. Sirwaiya, a biochemistry and education alumnus of Mumbai University who took charge as principal of Wilson College in June 2000. Sirwaiya who joined Wilson College in 1982, served as hostel warden and treasurer before taking over as principal. Though Wilson College opened its doors to its first batch of 30 students in 1832, it moved into its present premises (a declared heritage structure spread over five and a half acres) in 1889, and as such is older than Mumbai University (founded 1857) itself. When Bombay University was formally decreed by vice regal charter, Wilson, together with the Grant Medical and Elphinstone colleges were affiliated with the new university. Since then, Wilson College which currently has an enrollment of 3,300 students instructed by a faculty of 137, has been engaged in attaining its mission “to produce intellectually well trained, morally upright, socially conscious and spiritually oriented men and women.” With considerable success. It was the first college to initiate Sanskrit studies; Dr. Dugald Mackichan who served as principal for 36 years (1884-1920) served as vice chancellor of Bombay University for a record four terms; it started the first bio chemistry department of Bombay University in 1934; Dr. J.H. Taylor of the college’s physics department was one of the founders (together with Dr. Homi Bhabha) of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) Mumbai and the college’s in-house magazine The Wilsonian was started in 1909 and has been in continuous publication since. The educational work and scholarship of Dr. Wilson himself has received adequate recognition right from his nomination as one of the original Fellows named in the Act of Incorporation of Bombay University. The vital advantage of the good start…
