| Dhaka Medical College and Hospital | |
|---|---|
| Established | 1946 |
| Type | Public |
| Admin. staff | 3,406 |
| Students | 1,050 |
| Location | Dhaka, Bangladesh |
| Campus | Urban, 25 acres (0.101 km²) |
Dhaka Medical College and Hospital (DMCH), established in 1946 during the British colonial rule, is the top medical college in Bangladesh. Situated at the heart of the city in the academic zone along with University of Dhaka and Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Dhaka Medical College is an educational institution with a rich heritage.
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Established in 1946,first class started on 10th July, so 10th July celebrated as |"DMC DAY|". It took about 10 years for the Dhaka Medical College and Hospital to start operations because of bureaucratic entanglements. The Dhaka Medical College and its affiliate, Dhaka Medical College Hospital, were accommodated in a building constructed in 1904 as the Secretariat Building for the province of East Bengal and Assam. The building was transferred to the University of Dhaka in 1921. One part of it was converted into the university's medical centre, one part into a student dormitory, while the residual part was allotted for use as the academic wing of the Faculty of Arts.
The whole building was used as "American Base Hospital" during World War II. When the Americans left, a one hundred bed hospital was established in it. This created the base of the DMCH, which at the beginning had only four departments - Medical, Surgery, Gynaecology and ENT. The institute did not have any hostel for students. Male students were allowed to reside in Dhaka University's student halls, but girls had to attend classes from their homes. After the Partition of Bengal in 1947, a large number of students came from Calcutta Medical College and sought admission in Dhaka Medical College. Similarly, many left Dhaka Medical College for Calcutta. The college and hospital premises were expanded in new temporary sheds, some of which were built for outdoor services of the hospital and some others for students' hostels. New buildings for hostel, college and hospital were constructed in phases: a hostel for girls in 1952, a hostel for male students in 1954-55, a new complex of academic buildings in 1955, and a hostel for internee doctors in 1974-75.A new academic building and also a new hospital building (DMCH-2) are under construction.
For the top 200 freshmen places in every year in whole Bangladesh, nearly 36000 (Thirty Six thousand) applicants sat for the medical college entrance examination. The different batches of Dhaka Medical College are named with the prefix K, as for example K-67. The meaning of the prefix K is still mysterious and there are different opinions. Some say, K, being the 11th letter of the English alphabet, signifies the 11th medical college of the-then Indian subcontinent. Some other opine that K is for Kalcutta, as many of the students came from Calcutta Medical college and were admitted straight to 3rd, 4th or even 5th year. That's why some other people say that K stands for Klinical batch (Latin). So the K-1 was not probably the first batch who were admitted as a first year medical students at Dhaka Medical College in 1946/47. It is logical if you do a math. For example, K-36 batch was admitted in 1979. Had there been no 1971 or merging of 2 HSC batches (76-77) into one, they would have been counted as K38 batch. Now if you add 46+38, it corresponds to the year 1983/84. So the first batch students who were admitted as first year students in 1946/47 was probably the 5th batch graduating from Dhaka Medical College as K-5. Their senior 4 batches were the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th year medical students who moved to Dhaka Medical College from other medical schools of India. However, some old Dhaka Medical College alumni said that naming all batches with "K" wasn't there initially. They claimed that it started after 1971. There prevails also a tradition of naming the batches, like Batch K-66 & K-67 are called 'Shongkhoneel'(শঙ্খনীল) & 'Lubdhok' (লুব্ধক).