Panjab University: Early History

Rajesh Kochhar

Email: rkochhar2000@pu.ac.in

East Panjab University was established on 1 October 1947, in continuation of and as a successor to University of Punjab Lahore, through an ordinance issued by the Central Government on 27 September 1947. The East Punjab Governor, Sir Chandulal Trivedi, in his capacity as Chancellor, decided that the appointment of Vice-Chancellor should be deferred till the ordinance was replaced by an act of the legislature. The working of the University was entrusted to a provisional nine-member Syndicate comprising Sir Jai Lal; Justice Teja Singh; Gyanesh Chandra Chatterji; Sardar Bahadur Bhai Jodh Singh; Dewan Anand Kumar; Col. B. S. Nat; Principal Niranjan Singh; Professor Diwan Chand Sharma; and the Registrar D. N. Bhalla. The first three Vice-Chancellors came from this list.[1]

On 31 October 1947 the Syndicate formally requested Justice Teja Singh (1889-1965), a puisne judge of the East Punjab High Court, to perform the functions of the Vice-Chancellor until official appointment. He was officially given the honorary charge on 9 February 1948, but his term was short-lived. He resigned on 31 March 1949 to devote full time to his new office of  the first Chief Justice of the PEPSU ( Patiala and East Punjab States Union) High Court, which he had accepted in November 1948. He however continued to be an active member of the University Syndicate.

Deputy Prime Minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel with Justice Teja Singh,  Vice-Chancellor, at the first Convocation held at Ambala, 5 Mar. 1949.

Deputy Prime Minister  Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel addressing the first Convocation of the University held at Ambala, 5 Mar. 1949.

G. C. Chatterji (1894-1971)  who had by now retired from  government  service  was appointed  (first full-time) Vice-Chancellor. He however  held office only for four months, 1 April – 31 July 1949, as  he was appointed member  of the Union Public Service Commission.  Later (1953) he became Vice-Chancellor of Rajasthan University and still later Chairman  of the National Book Trust. In 1962 he was awarded Padma Bhushan.

Chatterji’s association with Punjab was a long-standing one. His father Prabhat Chandra Chatterji while a student of Scottish Church College Calcutta converted to Christianity and to avoid the wrath of his community moved to Narowal in Lahore district where he became a teacher in the missionaries-run school. Gyanesh Chatterji  obtained his MA from Government College Lahore and went  on a Government of India scholarship to to Cambridge from where he did his BA. At Cambridge he became a personal friend of the noted Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujam.  A member of the Indian Education Service. he  worked as  professor of Philosophy at his alma mater from 1923-24 till 1939 when he took over as Principal of Central Training College  Lahore for training English language teachers. Contrary to the claims made by  his descendents, and others  he never  served as Principal of Government College Lahore [1a].  On Partition he was given the twin posts of Secretary, Education Department and Director of Public Instruction, East Punjab.

Members of the Central Training College Dramatic Club Lahore  with the Principal G. C. Chatterji, 1940. Historical importance of the photograph arises not because of Chatterji but the seven-year old boy sitting on the floor,  Zia Mohyeddin, who acted in the play written and directed by his father, Prof. Khadim Mohyeddin, seated second from right. Subsequently Zia acted in Lawrence of Arabia (1962) and numerous other movies and TV serials.

On Chatterji’s resignation as Panjab Vice-Chancellor, the appointment went to Dewan Anand Kumar (1894-1981) who remained at the helm of affairs for eight long and crucial years, 1 August 1949- 30 June 1957.

Anand Kumar was a landed aristocrat. His Kashmiri Pandit family, with the surname Raina, served the Sikh kingdom with distinction which in turn rewarded it amply. Next, the family placed its services at the disposal of the British who rewarded it still further. Anand Kumar’s father, Narendra Nath (1864-d), passed his MA from Government College Lahore in 1886. In 1888 he joined the Provincial Civil Service and was awarded the title Dewan Bahadur in 1908. In 1911 he was appointed  Commissioner of the Lahore Division. He however was not permitted to continue in view of the circular issued by Sir Reginald Henry Craddok, Home Member of the Viceroy’s Executive Council, that no Indian be appointed as Commissioner. Narendra Nath even took a year’s leave  to personally represent to the the Secretary of State for India  Lord Crewe, but to no avail. In protest he resigned from service in 1916 and decided to join politics. As if to placate him , the Government bestowed on him the honorary title Raja, in 1917. In 1920 he was elected unopposed, on a Hindu Mahasabha ticket, to the first Punjab Legislative Council to represent the Punjab Landholders general constituency. He remained an active member of the the Council till 1938

Anand Kumar was related to the Nehrus by ties of marriage. In 1902, his elder sister Rameshwari was married to Jawaharlal Nehru’s cousin Brijlal Nehru (son of Moti Lal Nehru’s elder brother Nand Lal Nehru). Brijlal and Rameshwari’s son Braj Kumar Nehru began his career as an ICS officer of Punjab cadre. In 1984, Panjab University conferred on him the degree of Doctor of Literature (honoris causa) for his distinguished services in different fields.

Narendra Nath with his family members, c. 1920. Standing in the row behind him is Diwan Anand Kumar holding his first child.

Dewan Anand Kumar was educated in Cambridge, and appointed a Reader in the Zoology department of Punjab University Lahore in 1920, and head of the department in 1942 . In 1946 he was made the Dean of University Instruction, a post he continued to hold in the new University. In 1924, he was appointed member of both Dyal Singh College Trust Society and Dyal Singh Public Library Trust, Lahore. It was left to him to administer both these after Partition.

Anand Kumar was imbued with a sense of noblesse oblige and was well-known for his ‘magnanimity and liberality’. Be it a student in need of an additional scholarship (Narendra Luther) or a college lecturer in need of extra funds to avail of a fellowship abroad (Madan Mohan Puri) the Vice-Chancellor was forthcoming with help on behalf of the University and that too most graciously. Anand Kumar (affectionately and reverentially known as the Dewan Sahib in his time) is the true builder of the university as we know it today. Anand Kumar would have liked to lead the University from its permanent home in Chandigarh but that was not to be because of ‘some difference of opinion with the Chief Minister [Pratap Singh Kairon]’. It is noteworthy that Kumar’s Nehru connection remained irrelevant.

His successor Amar Chand Joshi (1908-1971) had a brilliant academic record in spite of his suffering from trachoma from childhood. He obtained his MSc in botany from Punjab University Lahore in 1930 and served as a demonstrator in the botany department for a few months till in 1931 he became an assistant professor at Banaras Hindu University, where he remained till 1944. In between in 1937 he obtained his DSc. Another celebrated student of Shiv Ram Kashyap at Lahore was Mohinder Singh Randhawa who had been Joshi’s classmate since the  Intermediate days . As Randhawa later wrote, apart from botany the two shared another commonality; both came from Hoshiarpur district.

Randhawa came to United Provinces in 1934 after completing his ICS probation in England and promptly renewed professional and personal friendship with Joshi. In 1945 when Randhawa came to Delhi as Secretary Imperial Council of Agricultural Research, Joshi also came to Delhi as an editor in the Dictionary of Economic Products Project under Council of Scientific and Industrial Research. In 1945 Joshi was selected to Punjab Education Service and posted at Government College Lahore. On Partition, Joshi, accompanied by his family, came to Delhi, and became Randhawa’s house guest till his posting as professor of botany at Government College Hoshiarpur where he remained from 1947 till 1951. In 1951 Joshi was appointed Principal of Government Teacher Training College Jullundur where he remained till 1953 when he was promoted to the post of Director Public Instruction. He went on to serve as Vice-Chancellor from 1 July 1957 till 30 July 1965.[2] Subsequently, in 1967, Joshi became Vice-Chancellor of Benares Hindu University.

The turbulence of the early Panjab university is brought home by the fact that it was funded not only by the state government and the central education ministry but also by the central ministry for rehabilitation. The tasks before it were clear cut from day one: To find a place to operate from; conduct examinations; resume teaching; and look after the educational needs of the vast number of displaced persons.

Envelope of a letter sent by Panjab University Simla. The postmark is dated 18 Oct. 1947, barely 17 days after the establishment of the University!

Simla was a natural place for the University to start from, because it was the temporary capital of the state. The University camp office remained here till 1948 end. In the meantime the administrative offices were shifted to Solan cantonment, where they were housed in hill-top barracks spread over an area of about eight kilometers. Anand Kumar operated from here till 1953 when he shifted to Delhi because of the heart problem.

Envelope of a letter from the University office in Solan, 2 Dec. 1950.

It is remarkable that the University was able to bring its examination system back on the rails by 1950. But the restoration of teaching posed serious problems. Quite obviously no existing institution could have accommodated all the teaching departments and colleges the University inherited from Lahore. Piecemeal work had to be thrust upon semi-willing and unwilling hosts.

In October 1947 itself, physics and chemistry classes were started in, and under the control of, Delhi University, because this was the only place where facility for carrying out science practicals existed. Information was passed on to the students and teachers over All India Radio and through newspapers. Delhi University however remained a rather ‘unwilling host’.

Chemical Engineering was hosted by the Delhi Polytechnic (later Delhi College of Engineering ) from February 1948. Since Delhi now had a large number of Punjabi refugees who wanted further education, Panjab University was permitted to intrude into Delhi University’s jurisdiction and start a Camp College, from 1 March 1948 which could offer instruction only in the evenings because the two school buildings it was located in ran their own classes during day time. The College even set up a hostel in 150 small canvas tents, supplied by the Central ministry of rehabilitation, and pitched in the grounds. In 1950 , the College was made into an Evening College for ‘bonafide employees only, irrespective of whether they were displaced persons or not’. This was India’s first ever Evening College. Thus ‘[T]hrough force of circumstances, the Panjab University launched upon a new experiment in University education’. Many other universities subsequently set up evening colleges of their own. Panjab University College was shifted from Delhi to Chandigarh in 1961. In the meantime, on 31 March 1959 Delhi Camp College was handed over to the Dyal Singh College Trust of which Dewan Anand Kumar was the honorary secretary.

It is in the Camp College that the journalism department was restarted in 1948 , which borrowed the services of eminent journalists as faculty. (It shifted to Chandigarh in June 1962.) For the rest, the University had to fall back on its own affiliated colleges, though expectedly the sailing was far from smooth. Zoology was shifted to Government College Hoshiarpur, while botany and pharmacy were hosted by Khalsa College Amritsar, which also accommodated Punjabi. The unusualness of the times can be gauged from the fact that for full 11 years the University Punjabi department within the Khalsa College prepared students for the lower-level Gyani and Vidvan examinations only while the M.A. classes remained under the control of the College, as before.

The remnant of Lahore’s undergraduate Hailey Commerce College was attached first to Vaish College Rohtak, but since classes could not be started, the College was taken to Bakrota in Dalhousie (1 September 1949). It was realized that the “ cost of living at Dalhousie was much higher as compared with that in places in the plains”, so that “the students were finding it very difficult to cope with expenses and only the rich people could afford to send their children there”. Accordingly, 1951 end , the Commerce College was shifted to Jullundur and housed in an evacuee property. Concern for the underprivileged was typical of the times, although it seems to have been forsaken now by the erstwhile beneficiaries. Hindi and Sanskrit were looked after by the Dayanand Anglo-Vedic College Jullundur. For the completion of the studies of the law students uprooted from Lahore, classes were temporarily arranged at Simla by taking Bishop Cotton Preparatory School on rent. A full-fledged Law College started classes in 1950 at Jullundur in an evacuee property.

Khalsa College Amritsar became temporary home for the University Botany department while. Government College Hoshiarpur became the natural choice for Zoology by virtue of the fact that a well-known zoologist was the Principal. Vishwa Nath (1897-1976) must rank among the rarest of academics whose professional career was fashioned by their proficiency in sports. He studied at Government College Lahore and passed his MSc [3] in 1920. He was a very good cricket player and was a member of the University team. So impressed was the Maharaja of Patiala by his cricketing abilities that Vishwa Nath was issued an appointment letter a full year before he actually passed out. Vishwanath joined Mahindra College Patiala as a lecturer in 1920. He left for Cambridge in 1923 for his PhD which he completed in record two years’ time in 1925. In 1927 he was appointed Principal of the College. Ho however resigned that year itself to join Government College Lahore, where he became head of the department in 1943.He was not only the director of the University Zoological Laboratories but also the president of the University Cricket Association. On Partition, he was transferred to Government College Dharmshala but he remained here only for a few months. On 1 March 1948, Dr Vishwa Nath took over as the Principal Government College Hoshiarpur. On retirement from Punjab government education service in 1952 Vishwa Nath was appointed University professor of zoology (‘a rank higher than that of the Principal’). He finally superannuated in 1959.[4]

In October 1948 Kapurthala (then in PEPSU) offered to host all science departments but the East Punjab Chief Minister Gopi Chand Bhargava was adamant that the University would not go out of his state. One would have thought that Jullundur which was already an established educational centre would have suggested itself as the seat of the refugee university. But, early 1949 it was decided to bring science teaching and most other departments under one roof at Government College Hoshiarpur, which had been established as an intermediate college in 1927 and upgraded to degree level in 1943. It was generally believed that Hoshiarpur was chosen at the behest of Prof. Diwan Chand Sharma. [5] He had earlier been Head of the English Department at Dayanand Anglo Vedic College Lahore as also the Convener of Board of Studies for English at the Lahore University was appointed as Honorary Professor of English for teaching honours classes and was given charge of English Department at the Camp College. He continued to be associated with the University English department till 1960. He was elected to first Lok Sabha in 1952 from the Hoshiarpur constituency on Indian National Congress ticket. He went on to win the next three consecutive elections, this time from Gurdaspur, in 1957, 1962 and 1967.

On 1 October 1951 the control of Government College Hoshiarpur was transferred to Panjab University. It was now named Panjab University College, and the Government College staff stood deputed to the University. New buildings were constructed to meet the requirements of a university, and existing buildings in the town commandeered for use as hostels. The building of the erstwhile Islamia School was made into boys’ hostel for Intermediate and Degree students. As many as 16 residential houses were hired in the Model Town locality to serve as residences for post-graduate and honours school students. A Muslim evacuee bungalow near the College, on the Sutheri Road, was made into girls’ hostel.

Of the departments at Hoshiarpur, the English department was the most colourful. An MP, a Syndic and a Professor, D. C. Sharma was Panjab University’s first power centre noticed even by the students. On the other side of the fence stood an out-and out academic and a foreigner, Miss Amy Geraldine Stock (1902-1988) [6].  So soon after the end of colonial rule, a cheerful and friendly British lady riding a bicycle and mixing with everybody must have been quite a sight. Born of Irish parents and a 1925 graduate of Oxford University in English literature she was already well known for her consistent anti-imperialist, pro-Indian and socialist views and activities. She married in 1933 but the marriage soon fell apart even though the divorce did not materialize till April 1947.

She now applied for a professorship at Dacca University. The Vice-Chancellor Dr Mahmud Hasan had been writing his doctoral thesis in Oxford when Stock was a student there and had heard that she would like to teach in India when the latter became free. Furthermore her selection would keep an unwanted local candidate out. She reached Dacca on 1 August 1947 and remained there for only three years. The Intelligence Branch did not approve of her outspokenness. Moreover, Dr Itrat Husain Zubeiri who was completing his term (1948-50) as Carnegie fellow at Merton College Oxford was waiting in the wings. When a colleague left her an envelope containing clippings of two advertisements from India, the message was clear. She applied for Professor’s post at Banaras Hindu University as well as for the Reader’s in Panjab University. It was the latter that produced results. Soon enough, she received a letter asking her to meet Prof. D. C. Sharma in Delhi. She joined at Hoshiarpur in May 1951 and remained here till 1956, when she returned to Bengal, this time to Calcutta. In 1961 she was invited to join University of Rajasthan Jaipur to set up a post-graduate English department. This was an important assignment because she was given a free hand in hiring the faculty.

Presence of Stock persuaded many students to come to Hoshiarpur rather than take admission into a college in their vicinity. An academic colleague of Stock whose influence extended beyond the Department was Raj Kumar Kaul. His Punjab connection arose because his father was a police officer here. Kaul began his studies at Government College Lahore but completed them from Camp College Delhi in 1948. He went to Magdalen College Oxford, and returned with a doctorate. After teaching in Delhi for some time, he joined as a lecturer at Hoshiarpur. Much to his disappointment Kaul was bypassed for promotion at Chandigarh. In 1962 he moved to Jaipur to renew his association with Stock who had selected him as a Reader.

In 1953 Stock and Kaul took the lead in forming TKT Club ( Talk over a Cup of Tea) which became a rather elitist social and intellectual forum. Kaul would provide hospitality of his own house to continue the literary conversations and recitals. Interestingly, Manmohan Singh, the future Prime Minister, ‘was not a member of this select group’. [7] More generally,  social, cultural and political activities centred around the two restaurants known as Bhojan Bhandars, one in the campus itself and the other in the town near the Clock Tower.

Hoshiarpur impacted its students in various ways. One evening as part of annual Lohri celebration a poetical symposium was organized where Gurdial Mander and Sohan Singh Misha recited their poems. The audience response was rather unexpected. The reoris (made of sugar or jaggery and sesame seeds) they had brought with them to munch were instead thrown at the young budding poets [8].

Hosting a University was an entirely new experience for the small town of Hoshiarpur. There were many a knock at the mathematician Dr Hans Raj Gupta’s door asking him for medical advice. Not to disappoint the hopeful callers, he actually became a self-taught homeopathic doctor! [9]

The process of shifting the departments to Chandigarh began in 1958 and was largely completed by 1960 so that the Hoshiarpur College was returned to Punjab Government in August 1960. The first academic building to be constructed in the Chandigarh Campus was the Chemical Engineering. Vice-Chancellor’s office was located here and has remained here ever since.

The Prime Minister Pt Jawaharlal Nehru came to the Campus a number of times. His last visit  was to the Library

Panjab University Library

The credit for starting the University Library goes to the librarian  Shanti Sarup Saith (1908-1986), who had held a similar post in Lahore.  On learning  that the all-British United Services Club was closing down its operations,  Saith entered into an agreement with the Club to acquire their library of about 12000 volumes at the rate of one rupee per book. This collection , at the time the entire University Library, was housed in  three rooms rented in the Club premises [9a]. The Library became functional on 10 November 1947. Saith resigned from the University in 1948 to take up appointment as curator of the Bureau of Education in the Education Ministry at Delhi. His association with the University  however was  continued by the Syndicate by designating him ‘the Vice-Chancellor’s Special Representative for Library Affairs’ .

Ten years later, on 13 December 1958, the Vice-President of India, Dr S. Radhakrishnan laid the   foundation stone of  the University Library building at Chandigarh. Exactly a year later, the books were shifted from Simla to the partially constructed building. When we joined the University in July 1962 the building was already complete and the Library  in regular use.

Fifteen months later came the news that Pt Nehru would be coming to Chandigarh en route to the nearby Pinjore to open the Hindustan Machine Tools factory there. The opportunity was taken to get the Library  formally opened by Nehru, on 23 October 1963.   Joshi’s tenure as Vice-Chancellor would be over in two years’ time. This epoch thus brings to a close the end of the first phase of the institutional history of Panjab University.

Prime Minister Pt Jawaharlal Nehru with Pierre Jeanneret, the lead architect,   inspecting the models of buildings of Panjab University Chandigarh, then under construction.

Prime Minister Pt Jawaharlal Nehru with the Vice-Chancellor Dr A. C. Joshi inside Panjab University Library after its formal inauguration on 23 Oct. 1963.

[1] A valuable source for the history of  the first 20 years of Panjab University is R. R. Sethi and J. L. Mehta (1968) A History of the Panjab University Chandigarh 1947-1967 ( Chandigarh: Panjab University Publication Bureau).[1a] See, eg,  Amita Malik 2002 A philosopher broadcaster {PC Chatterji}, The Tribune, 21 Sep; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indu_Mitha.]
[2] I recall from newspaper reports of half a century ago that at the last Syndicate (or Senate) meeting presided over by Joshi himself he was appointed Vice-Chancellor Emeritus. This however was struck out by the Chancellor while approving the Minutes-Ed.
[3] According to Syed Sultan Mahmood Hussain (2008) Second 50 Years of Government College Lahore 1914-1963 (Lahore: Izharsons), p. 43, there were only three students who obtained their MSc in zoology in 1920; Hem Singh was placed in the first division while both Vishwanath Pandit and Bashambar Nath Sharma got a second division.
[4] Dr Trilok Nath Kochhar (my father) who set up his private medical practice in Chandigarh in 1963 made a house call to see an ailing Vishwa Nath. The patient was visibly upset that the doctor had not read, had not even heard of, his zoological text books.
[5] Gurnam Singh Sidhu Brard (2007) East of Indus: My Memories of Old Punjab (New Delhi: Hemkunt), p. 169.
[6] Basil Clarke (1999) Taking What Comes: A Biography of A. G. Stock (Dinah) (ed.: Surjit Hans) ( Chandigarh: Panjab University Publication Bureau). The publication came about as a result of the initiative of the Vice-Chancellor Prof. Madan Mohan Puri who had been a student in Hoshiarpur.
[7] Daman Singh (2014) Strictly Personal: Manmohan and Gursharan ( Harper Collins) ( Page number not seen from excerpts on Internet).
[8] Amrit Lal Paul (2002) S. S. Misha (New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi), p. 19
[9] We heard this story in the early 1960s in the Chandigarh-based Mathematics Department.

[9a]  ML Saini 2004 Aristocrat-Librarian Shanti Sarup Saith, Library Herald, Vol. 42. No. 4, pp 382-400; see p. 389.] Also see Ref 1, p. 333.