A walk through the 192-year-old heritage of the country’s first medical college

Kolkata: An immersive walk through the historic buildings and grounds of Calcutta Medical College, the first institution in Asia to impart systemic education in Western medicine, traced the evolution of medicine, education and society, while situating history within the living and breathing campus of today.The heritage walk was organised on the occasion of the 192nd foundation day by Medical College Ex-students' Association (MCESA). "This walk honours the layered legacy of the institution — medical, architectural, intellectual, and human," said MCESA vice-president Abhik Ghosh. Another member, Anirban Dalui, felt there was a need to make medical history accessible to non-specialist audiences through storytelling.
Medical College was established on Jan 28, 1835, when colonial Calcutta faced repeated public-health emergencies—malaria, cholera, kala-aza — making modern, evidence-based healthcare an urgent civic need. Mountford Joseph Bramley was appointed the first principal of Medical College of Bengal in 1835, and Henry Goodeve was the first professor of medicine, although there was no separate department of medicine then.Around 150 participants who met in front of the administrative block — a Victorian structure erected in 1911 — were guided through a curated selection of distinguished institutional spaces.Alumnus of Medical College and convenor of the event, Amit Ghose, who conducted the walk, said, "It was at the anatomy building that Madhusudan Gupta performed the first human cadaver dissection by an Indian in 1836, under Goodeve's guidance, challenging deep-seated taboos. The building still houses the dissection hall and has a museum, which has 150 anatomic specimens preserved."The next stop was Swarnamoyee Hostel and Bidumukhi Hostel. "Maharani Swarnamoyee of Cossimbazar Raj estate donated Rs 1,50,000 to build the hostel for female medical students. The other hostel was named after Bidumukhi Bose, one of the first female medical students," said Sujoy Majumdar, another alumnus who conducted the walk.The group then visited Eden Hospital, which was inaugurated as a 100-bed facility in April 1882 by Sir Ashley Eden, Lt Governor of Bengal. "A crucial feature was the isolation ward for cholera patients, the first example of an isolation ward in Asia. It was here that Sir Leonard Rogers carried out research on cholera. When the cholera ward shifted elsewhere, this ward became a septic ward for Eden Hospital — described as the first of its kind in the subcontinent. Over time, it grew into a 259-bed obstetrics and gynaecology unit," Ghose said.The David Hare Block opened in 1910 as there was no separate surgical ward at Medical College. It was named Prince of Wales Hospital to commemorate his visit to India and renamed David Hare Block in 1976 as a tribute to the only non-medical principal on his bicentennial birth anniversary. "I spent 10 years in this ward, and we had the privilege of a sunlit OT with Italian marble and the gallery from which we used to see the operations," Ghose recalled.The walk ended on the iconic stairs of the "oldest building on the premises" — the MCH building — which came up as the college required greater space to accommodate a hospital to get recognition from Royal College of Surgeons of England and University of London. "Lord Dalhousie laid the foundation stone in 1848, and it was inaugurated in 1852 to accommodate 350 patients," Ghose added.