Postal stamp featuring Deccan College’s Gothic-style building to be released next week

Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari will be present on the occasion to mark the bicentenary year of India's third oldest higher education institution.

To mark its 200th year on October 6, the Deccan College Post Graduate and Research Institute will be getting its own commemorative postal stamp issued by the India Post.

Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari will be present on the occasion to mark the bicentenary year of India’s third oldest higher education institution.

The Rs 5 stamp will depict the Victorian Neo-Gothic style main building of the college. This building was constructed using a grant of Rs 1 lakh donated by Jamsetji Jejeebhoy, a Parsi cotton merchant, during the late 1860s. His philanthropy also led to the establishment of Mumbai’s JJ School of Arts and JJ Hospital, both of which are named after Jejeebhoy.

Mountstuart Elphinstone, the then governor of The Bombay Presidency, set up The Hindoo College on October 6, 1821. The college, built using Dakshina Fund, was established as a centre to propagate Sanskrit studies in Pune.

With humble beginnings, the Sanskrit classes were first conducted from the present-day Vishrambaugwada, located in the heart of Pune city. The Dakshina fund was first given by the then Maratha Sardar Khanderao Dabhade and later continued to be paid by the Peshwas.

The Hindoo College was renamed twice — first, to Poona College in 1851, and later as Deccan College in 1864. The present-day campus, sprawled across 115 acres, came into existence in March 1968. Except for a brief period between 1934 and 1939, when the college was ordered to be shut by the British rulers, Deccan College has functioned through the two centuries.

The illustrious alumni of Deccan College include Ramkrishna Gopal Bhandarkar, Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Gurudev Ramachandra Dattatreya Ranade,Gopal Ganesh Agharkar and Iravati Karve, among others. Tilak was a resident student, occupying the boys’ hostel room number 134 between 1873 and 187 while pursuing his Master’s degree.

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