University of Mumbai

University of Mumbai

मुंबई विद्यापीठ
Seal of University of Mumbai
Former names	University of Bombay (1857 - 1996)
Motto	Sanskrit: शीलवृतफला विद्या
Motto in English	"The Fruit of Learning is Good Character and Righteous Conduct"
Type	Public
Established	18 July 1857 (1857-07-18)
Chancellor	Dr. Abhimanyu Reddu
Vice-Chancellor	Prof. Paramvir singh Beniwal (July 2015 – present)
Dean	Prof. Abhijeet Ahlawat
Location	Maharashtra, India
Campus	Urban
Founder	John Wilson
Colors	Saffron[1]
Affiliations	UGC, NAAC, AIU
Website	mu.ac.in

The University of Mumbai is one of the first state universities of India and the oldest in Maharashtra.

The University of Mumbai offers Bachelors, Masters and Doctoral courses, as well as diplomas and certificates in many disciplines. The language of instruction for most courses is English. The University of Mumbai has three campuses across Mumbai (Kalina Campus, Thane Sub Campus and Fort Campus) and one outside Mumbai. The Fort campus carries out administrative work only. Several institutes in Mumbai previously affiliated to the university are now autonomous institutes or universities. The University of Mumbai is one of the largest universities in the world. In 2011, the total number of enrolled students was 549,432.^[2] The University of Mumbai currently has 711 affiliated colleges.^[3]

History

Historical building of the University in Mumbai

In accordance with "Wood's despatch", drafted by Sir Charles Wood in 1854, The University of Bombay was established in 1857 after presentation of a petition from the Bombay Association to the British colonial government in India.^[4] The University of Mumbai was modeled on similar universities in the United Kingdom, specifically the University of London.^[4]:188

The first departments established were the Faculty of Arts at Elphinstone College in 1835 and the Faculty of Medicine at Grant Medical College in 1845.^[4] Both colleges existed before the university was founded and surrendered their degree-granting privileges to the university. The first degrees awarded in 1862 were Bachelor of Arts and Licentiate in Medicine.^[4]

Initially, the Town Hall in Mumbai was used as the university's offices.

Until 1904, the university only conducted examinations, awarded affiliations to colleges, developed curricula and produced guidelines for colleges developing curricula.^[4] Teaching departments, research disciplines and post-graduate courses were introduced from 1904 and several additional departments were established. After India achieved independence in 1947, the functions and powers of the university were re-organised under The Bombay University Act of 1953. ^[5] The name of the University was changed from University of Bombay to University of Mumbai in 1996.^[6]

In 1949, student enrolment was 42,272 with 80 affiliated colleges. By 1975, these numbers had grown to 156,190 and 114 respectively.^[4]

Campuses

Bombay University Garden, circa 1890.

The University's administration building with the Bombay Stock Exchange in the background

Kalina Campus

The Kalina campus in suburban Mumbai covers an area of 93 hectares (230 acres) and houses graduate training and research centres. Departments offering courses in the sciences, technology, commerce, and humanities are located here. Most colleges of engineering and medicine affiliated to the University of Mumbai, though, are privately owned. The university does not have its own engineering or medicine departments.

Centres and institutes located in the Kalina Campus include;

• Examination House, also known as Mahatma Jyotirao Phule Bhavan houses the office of the Controller of Examinations. Centralized assessment of answer books for various departments is carried out in a separate four-storey annex. Examination processes were made more efficient by the introduction of online delivery of question papers for examinations, and assessment of answer books by scanning at remote examination centres. The academic depository of the university was started in collaboration with CDSL in 2015. The university is the first university in the country to start an academic depository. ^[7]
• National Centre for Nanosciences and Nanotechnology—a research facility.
• Department of Biophysics—the only such department in western India.
• Jawaharlal Nehru Library
• Garware Institute of Career Education and Development, whose courses include medical transcription and management courses such as agriculture business management, pharma management and tourism management.
• MAST (मस्त) FM, the campus radio station of the university operating at 107.8 MHz frequency modulation.
• Alkesh Dinesh Mody Numismatic Museum which houses displays of currency from around the world.
• Alkesh Dinesh Mody Institute for Financial and Management Studies (ADMI) which offers BMS, MFSM and MMS programmes.^[8]
• Department of Extra Mural Studies which conducts weekend courses in many disciples including astronomy, astrophysics, plant and animal taxonomy, hobby robotics, and hobby electronics.
• The Institute of Distance and Open Learning (IDOL) which offers courses in humanities, sciences, commerce, computer science, and information technology.
• Western Regional Instrumentation Centre (WRIC)—a research and training facility for instrumentation engineering and science.
• Centre for African Studies
• Centre for Eurasian Studies
• A rose garden where more than a hundred varieties of rose have been cultivated.
• Marathi Bhasha Bhavan Centre which conducts academic and cultural activities associated with the Marathi language.

Thane Campus

The Thane Campus, established in 2014, spans an area of 2.4 ha (6 acres) and is a modern, 2-storey complex. It houses administrative offices, the School of Law, University of Mumbai and also undertakes management courses.

Fort Campus

The University of Bombay was established in 1857 at the Fort campus, which is located near the southern end of Mumbai. It houses the administrative division of the university on a 5.3 ha (13 acres) site. It has 116,000 m² (1.25×10^⁶ sq ft) of built-up area, 2,000 m² (22,000 sq ft) of classrooms, and 7,800 m² (84,000 sq ft) of laboratory space. There are 2 post-graduate centres, 354 affiliated colleges, and 36 departments. It is built in the Gothic style and the Rajabai Clock Tower stands on the lawns of the campus.

Rajabai Clock Tower

Rajabai Clock Tower

One of Mumbai's landmarks, the Rajabai Clock Tower was completed in the 1870s and houses the University of Mumbai's library. Sir George Gilbert Scott modeled the Rajabai Clock Tower on the clock tower of the Palace of Westminster in London.^[9] Local businessman Premchand Roychand contributed to the cost of construction and named the tower in memory of his mother, Rajabai. The tower is 85 m (280 ft) tall and has five storeys. At a height of 9.1 m (30 ft) from the ground, there are eight statues representing the Indian castes. The tower clock is reported to have played 16 tunes including Rule, Britannia. On the initiative of the then Vice-Chancellor, Dr. Rajan Welukar, the first phase of restoration of Rajabai Clock Tower started in 2013 and was completed in May 2015. Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) gave a Rs 4 crore grant for this phase of the restoration project.^[10]

Ratnagiri Campus

This minor campus, running mostly extramural courses, is located in the town of Ratnagiri.

Prominent institutes

Institute of Chemical Technology

Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute Mumbai

Several departments of the University of Mumbai are located away from the three Mumbai campuses. These include the departments of Medicine and Medical Research located in several prominent hospitals in Mumbai, such as the Tata Memorial Hospital, Bombay Hospital and G.S. Medical College and King Edward Memorial Hospital. The Institute of Chemical Technology, then known as the UDCT, was originally an institution of MU, but later gained university status.^[11] Tata Memorial Hospital is now affiliated to the Homi Bhabha National Institute.

Similarly, Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute was the first Engineering Institute in the University of Mumbai (1887)^[12] and Thadomal Shahani Engineering College was the first Engineering college in the University of Mumbai to start courses in Computer Engineering, Information Technology, Electronics Engineering and Biomedical Engineering. Sardar Patel College of Engineering is another reputed engineering college affiliated to the University .^[13]

In the School of Law, the Government Law College, Mumbai remains the most prominent institute since the university's inception.

The Institute of Chemical Technology was ranked 4th in the world for research in Chemical Engineering by professor Jude Sommerfeld of Georgia Institute of Technology, United States in 2014 for a 5-year period.^[14] It was a university department until it achieved university status.

The Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies is consistently ranked among the top 10 management institutes of India and was established in the year 1965 in collaboration with Stanford Graduate School of Business of Stanford University.^[15]

Libraries

The library

Jawaharlal Nehru Library (JNL) is the central library, located on the campus at Kalina.

The technology and applied research journals and books of the University of Mumbai are kept in the libraries of the Institute of Chemical Technology, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies and Tata Memorial Hospital.

Faculties and departments

The University of Mumbai has several hundred affiliated colleges offering undergraduate and post-graduate education, and conducting research in areas of science, commerce, arts, engineering, management, law, etc. Each college has its own campus and specialized departments/centres.

Areas of education and research are summarized in the table below:

Vice-Chancellors

• John Wilson 1857
• Raymond West
• Alexander Kinloch Forbes
• Sir Alexander Grant, 10th Baronet 1863–1868
• William Guyer Hunter 1869
• Herbert Mills Birdwood
• Rev Dugald Mackichan 1888-91
• Kashinath Trimbak Telang 1892–1893
• Ramkrishna Gopal Bhandarkar 1893–1894
• N. G. Chandavarkar 1911−1912
• John Heaton 1912–1915
• Pherozeshah Mehta 1915
• Mirza Akbar Khan 1930–31
• R. P. Paranjpe 1934
• Pandurang Vaman Kane
• John Matthai 1955–1957
• V. R. Khanolkar 1960–1963
• Shashikant Karnik
• Trimbak Krishna Tope 1971–1977
• M. D. Bengalee 1986
• Snehalata Deshmukh −2000
• Bhalchandra Mungekar 2000–2005
• Vijay Khole 2005 – September 2009,
• Chandra Krishnamurthy September 2009– July 2010, Acting Vice-Chancellor,
• Rajan Welukar July 2010 – July 2015,
• Sanjay V. Deshmukh July 2015 – present ^[23]

Notable alumni

Partner universities

Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) have been signed with University of Amsterdam, University of Bath, Liverpool Hope University, Ryerson University, IESEG School of Management, Kühne Logistics University, Tianjin University of Technology, Nankai University in China and Edith Cowan University in Australia.^[28]

See also

• School of Law, University of Mumbai
• List of universities in India
• Universities and colleges in India
• List of universities by number of billionaire alumni
• Education in India
• Distance Education Council
• University Grants Commission (India)
• National Assessment and Accreditation Council

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to University of Mumbai.

• Official website

Coordinates: 18°58′30″N 72°49′33″E / 18.97500°N 72.82583°E / 18.97500; 72.82583