Aligarh Muslim University

About

Aligarh Muslim University is an Indian collegiate, public, and research university located in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh which was originally established by Sir Syed Ahmad Khan as the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College in 1875. Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College became Aligarh Muslim University in 1920, following the Aligarh Muslim University Act. The university offers more than 300 courses in traditional and modern branches of education. It is an Institute of National Importance and is listed in the Union List under the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution of India.

The university has its roots in the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College, established in 1875 by Sir Syed Ahmad Khan. It began to function on 24 May 1875. A movement was associated with Sir Syed Ahmad Khan and the college came to be known as the Aligarh Movement, which pushed to materialise the need for establishing a modern education system for the Indian Muslim populace. He considered competence in English and Western sciences necessary skills for maintaining Muslims' political influence. Khan's vision for the college was based on his visit to Oxford University and Cambridge University, and he wanted to establish an education system similar to the British model. A committee was formed by the name of foundation of Muslim College and asked people to fund generously. Then Viceroy and Governor General of India Thomas Baring gave a donation of ₹10,000 while the Lt. Governor of the North Western Provinces contributed ₹1,000, and by March 1874 funds for the college stood at ₹1,53,920 and 8 annas. Maharaja Mahindra Singh Saab Bahadur of Patiala contributed ₹58,000 while Raja Shambhu Narayan of Benaras donated ₹60,000. Donations also came in from the Maharaja of Vizianagaram as well. The college was initially affiliated to the University of Calcutta for the matriculate examination but became an affiliate of Allahabad University in 1885. The seventh Nizam of Hyderabad, HEH Mir Osman Ali Khan made a remarkable donation of ₹5,00,000 to this institution in the year 1918.

Around 1900, the Muslim University Association was formed to spearhead efforts to transform the college into a university. The Government of India informed the association that a sum of rupees thirty lakhs should be collected to establish the university. Therefore, a Muslim University Foundation Committee was started and it collected the necessary funds. The contributions were made by Muslims as well as non-Muslims. Mohammad Ali Mohammad Khan and Aga Khan III had helped in realising the idea by collecting funds for building the Aligarh Muslim University. With the MAO College as a nucleus, the Aligarh Muslim University was then established by the Aligarh Muslim University Act, 1920. In 1927, the Ahmadi School for the Visually Challenged, Aligarh Muslim University was established and in the following year, a medical school was attached to the university. The college of unani medicine, Ajmal Khan Tibbya College, was established in 1927, and the Ajmal Khan Tibbiya College Hospital was established later in 1932. The Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College And Hospital was established in 1962 as a part of the university. In 1935, the Zakir Husain College of Engineering and Technology was also established as a constituent of the university. Before 1939, faculty members and students supported an all-India nationalist movement, but after 1939, political sentiment shifted towards support for a Muslim separatist movement. Students and faculty members supported Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the university came to be a center of the Pakistan Movement.

Sheikh Abdullah ("Papa Mian") is the founder of the Women's College of Aligarh Muslim University and had pressed for women's education, writing articles while also publishing a monthly women's magazine, Khatoon. To start the college for women, he had led a delegation to the Lt. Governor of the United Provinces while also writing a proposal to Sultan Jahan, Begum of Bhopal. Begum Jahan had allocated a grant of ₹100 per month for the education of women. On 19 October 1906, he successfully started a school for girls with five students and one teacher at a rented property in Aligarh. The foundation stone for the girls' hostel was laid by him and his wife, Waheed Jahan Begum ("Ala Bi"), after struggles on 7 November 1911. Later, a high school was established in 1921, gaining the status of an intermediate college in 1922, finally becoming a constituent of the Aligarh Muslim University as an undergraduate college in 1937. Later, Abdullah's daughters also served as principals of the women's college. One of his daughters was Mumtaz Jahan Haider, during whose tenure as principal Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad had visited the university and offered a grant of ₹9,00,000. She was involved in the establishment of the Women's College, organised various extracurricular events, and reasserted the importance of education for Muslim women. The professional courses are run with a co-educational system. Female students are accommodated in six well established halls of residence, where they have all facilities of living and studies. The hostels inside these halls are equipped with reading rooms, common rooms, sports facilities, and dining halls.

Adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA). Photography via Wikimedia Commons.