[24th
January, 1857] Repealed by W. Ben Act, 18
of 1951 PASSED BY THE LEGISLATIVE
COUNCIL OF INDIA. (Received the assent of the
Governor General on the 24th of January 1857.) AN ACT to establish and
incorporate an University at Calcutta. The Right HONORABLE CHARLES
JOHN VISCOUNT CANNING, Governor General of India The HONORABLE JOHN RUSSELL
COLVIN, Lieutenant-Governor of the North-Western Provinces. The HONORABLE FREDERICK
JAMES HALLIDAY, Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal. The HONORABLE SIR JAMES
WILLIAM COLYILE, Knight, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature in
Bengal. The Right Reverend DANIEL
WILSON, Doctor of Divinity, Bishop of Calcutta. The HONORABLE GEORGE ANSON,
General, Commander-in-Chief of the Forces in India. The HONORABLE JOSEPH
ALEXANDER DORIN, Member of the Supreme Council of India. The HONORABLE JOHN Low,
Major General, Companion of the Most Honorable Order of the. Bath, Member of
the Supreme Council of India. The HONORABLE JOHN PETER
GRANT, Member of the Supreme Council of India. The HONORABLE BARNES
PEACOCK, Member of the Supreme Council of India. CHARLES ALLEN, Esquire,
Member of the Legislative Council of India. HENRY RIOKETTS, Esquire,
Provisional Member of the Supreme Council of India. CHARLES BINNY TREVOR,
Esquire, Judge of the Sudder Court in Bengal. Prince GHOLAM MUHAMMUD. WILLIAM RITCHIE, Esquire,
Advocate General in Bengal. CECIL BEADON, Esquire,
Secretary to the Government of India. Colonel HENRY GOODWYN, of
the Bengal Engineers, Chief Engineer in Bengal. WILLIAM GORDON YOUNG,
Esquire, Director of Public Instruction in Bengal. Lieutenant-Colonel WILLIAM
ERSKINE BAKER, of the Bengal Engineers; Secretary to the Government of India. Lieutenant-Colonel ANDREW
SCOTT WAUGH, of the Bengal Engineers, Surveyor General of India. KENNETH MACKINNON, Esquire,
Doctor in Medicine. HODGSON PRATT, Esquire,
Inspector of Schools in Bengal. HENRY WALKER, Esquire,
Professor of Anatomy and Physiology in the Medical College of Bengal. THOMAS THOMSON, Esquire,
Doctor in Medicine, Superintendent of the Botanical Garden at Calcutta. FREDERICK JOHN MOUAT,
Esquire, Doctor in Medicine, and Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons. Lieutenant WILLIAM NASSAU
LEES, of the Bengal Infantry. The Reverend WILLIAM KAY,
Doctor of Divinity, Principal of Bishop's College. The Reverend ALEXANDER DUFF,
Doctor of Divinity. THOMAS OLDHAM, Esquire,
Superintendent of the Geological Survey of India. HENRY WOODROW, Esquire,
Inspector of Schools in Bengal. LEONIDAS CLINT, Esquire,
Principal of the Presidency College. PROSONNO COOMAR TAGORE,
Clerk Assistant of the Legislative Council of India. RAMAPERSHAD ROY, Government
Pleader in the Sudder Court of Bengal. The Reverend JAMES OGILVIE,
Master of Arts. The Reverend JOSEPH MULLENS,
Bachelor of Arts. Moulavy MUHAMMUD WUJEEH,
Principal of the Calcutta Mudrasah. ISHWAR CHUNDRA BIDYA SAGUR. Principal of the Sanskrit
College of Calcutta. RAMGOPAUL GHOSE, Formerly
Member of the Council of Education. ALEXANDER GRANT, Esquire,
Apothecary to the East India Company. HENRY STEWART REID, Esquire,
Director of Public Instruction in the North-Western Provinces. being the first Chancellor,
Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows of the said University, and all the persons who
may hereafter become or be appointed to be Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, or
Fellows as hereinafter mentioned, so long as they shall continue to be such
Chancellor, Vice Chancellor, or Fellows, are hereby constituted and declared to
be one Body Politic and Corporate by the name of the University of Calcutta;
and such Body Politic shall by such name have perpetual succession, and shall
have a common seal, and by such name shall sue and be sued, implead and be
impleaded, and answer and be answered unto, in every Court of Justice within
the territories in the possession and under the Government of the East India
Company.Calcutta
University Act, 1857 [Repealed]
[Act 2 of 1857]PREAMBLE
WHEREAS for the better encouragement of Her Majesty's subjects of all classes
and denominations within the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal and other
parts of India in the pursuit of a regular and liberal course of education, it
has been determined to establish an University, at Calcutta for the purpose of
ascertaining, by means of examination, the persons who have acquired
proficiency in different branches of Literature, Science, and Art, and of
rewarding them by Academical Degrees as evidence of their respective
attainments, and marks of honor proportioned thereunto; and whereas, for
effectuating the purposes aforesaid, it is expedient that such University
should be incorporated: It is enacted as follows: (that is to say)?
The following persons, namely,
The said body Corporate shall be able and capable in law to take, purchase, and
hold any property, moveable or immoveable, which may become vested in it for
the purposes of the said University by virtue of any purchase, grant,
testamentary disposition, or or otherwise; and shall be able and capable in law
to grant, demise, alien, or otherwise dispose of all or any of the property,
moveable or immoveable, belonging to the said University; and also to do all
other matters incidental or appartaining to a Body Corporate
The said Body Corporate shall consist of one Chancellor, one Vice-Chancellor,
and such number of ex-officio and other Fellows as the Governor General of
India in Council hath already appointed, or shall from time to time, by any
order published in the Calcutta Gazette, hereafter appoint; and the Chancellor,
Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows for the time being shall constitute the Senate of
the said University. Provided that, if any Person being Chancellor,
Vice-Chancellor, or Fellow of the said University, shall leave India without
the intention of returning thereto, his office shall thereupon become vacant.
The Governor General of India for the time being shall be the Chancellor of the
said University, and the first Chancelor shall, be the Right Honorable Charles
John Viscount Canning
The first Vice-Chancellor of the said University shall be Sir James William
Colvile, Knight. The office of Vice-Chancellor shall be held for two years
only; and the Vice-Chancellor herein-before nominated shall go out of office on
the first day of January 1859. Whenever a vacancy shall occur in the office of
Vice-Chancellor of the said University by death, resignation, departure from
India, effluxion of time or otherwise, the Governor General of India in Council
shall, by notification in the Calcutta Gazette, nominate a fit and proper
person, being one of the Fellows of the said University, to be Vice-Chancellor
in the room of the person occasioning such vacancy. Provided that, on any
vacancy in the said office which shall occur by effluxion of time, the Governor
General of India in Council shall have power to re-appoint the Vice-Chancellor
herein-before nominated or any future Vice-Chancellor to such office
The Lieutenant-Governors of Bengal and the North-Western Provinces, tbs Chief
Justice of the Supreme Court of Judicature at Fort William in Bengal or of any
Court of Judicature hereafter to be constituted to or in which the powers of
the said Supreme Court may be transferred or vested, the Bishop of Calcutta,
and the Members of the Supreme Council of India, all for the time being, shall
be ex-officio Fellows of the said University. The whole number of the Fellows
of the said University, exclusive of the Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor for the
time being, shall never be less than thirty; and whenever the number of the
said Fellows, exclusive as aforesaid, shall by death, resignation, departure
from India, on otherwise, be reduced below thirty, the Governor General of
India in Council shall forthwith, by notification in the Calcutta, Gazette,
nominate so many fit and proper persons to be Fellows of the said University as,
with the then Fellows of the said University, shall make the number of such
Fellows, exclusive as aforesaid, thirty. But nothing herein contained shall
prevent the Governor General of India in Council from nominating more than
thirty persons to be Fellows of the said University if he shall see fit
The Governor General of India in Council may cancel the appointment of any
person already appointed, or hereafter to be appointed a Fellow of the University;
and as soon as such order is notified in the Gazette, the person so appointed
shall cease to be a Fellow.
The Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows for the time being shall have the
entire management of and superintendence over the affairs, concerns, and
property of the said University; and in all cases unprovided for by this Act,
it shall be lawful for the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows to act in
such manner as shall appear to them best calculated to promote the purposes
intended by the said University. The said Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and
Fellows shall have full power from time to time to make and alter any bye-laws
and regulations (so as the same be not repugnant to law, or to the general
objects and provisions of this Act) touching the examination for degrees and
the granting of the same; and touching the examination for honors and the
granting of marks of honor for a higher proficiency in the different branches
of Literature. Science, and Art; and touching the qualifications of the
candidates for decree and the previous course of instruction to be followed by
them, and tin preliminary examinations to be submitted to by them; and touching
tin mode and time of convening the meetings of the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor,
and Fellows; and, in general, touching all other matters whatever regarding the
said University. And all such bye-laws and regulations, when reduced into writing,
and after the common seal of the said University shall have been affixed
thereto, shall be binding upon all persons, members of the said University, and
all candidates for degrees to be conferred by the same, provided such bye-laws
and regulations shall have been first submitted to and shall have received the
approval of the Governor General of India in Council.
All questions Which shall come before the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and
Fellows, shall be decided at a meeting of the Senate by the majority of the
members present; and the Chairman at any such meeting shall have a vote, and,
in case of an equality of votes, a second or casting vote. No question shall be
decided at any meeting, unless the Chancellor, or Vice-Chancellor, and five
Fellows, or, in the absence of the Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor, unless six
Fellows at the least, shall be present at the time of the decision. At every
meeting of the Senate, the Chancellor, or in his absence the Vice-Chancellor,
shall preside as Chairman; and, in the absence of both, a Chairman shall be
chosen by the Fellows present, or the major part of them
The said Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows for the time being shall have
full power from time to time to appoint, and, as they shall see occasion, to
remove all Examiners, Officers, and servants of the said University.
The said Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows, shall have Power, after
examination, to confer the several degrees of Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts,
Bachelor of Laws, Licentiate of Medicine, Doctor of Medicine, and Master of
Civil Engineering they shall also have power, after examination, to confer upon
the candidates for the said several degrees marks of honor for a high degree of
proficiency in the different branches of Literature, Science, and Art,
according to rules to be determined by the bye-laws to be from time to time
made by them under the power in that behalf given to them by this Act
Except by special order of the Senate, no person shall be admitted as a
candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts, Bachelor of Laws,
Licentiate of Medicine, Doctor of Medicine, or Master of Civil Engineering,
unless he shall present to the said Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows, a
certificate from one of the Institutions authorized in that behalf by the
Governor General of India in Council, to the effect that he has completed the
course of instruction prescribed by the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and
Fellows of the said University, in the bye-laws to be made by them under the
power in that behalf given by this Act
The said Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows shall cause an examination
for degrees to be held at least once in every year on every such examination,
the candidates shall be examined either by Examiners appointed for the purpose
from among the Fellows by the said Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows, or
by other Examiners so to be appointed; and on every such examination the
candidates, whether candidates for an ordinary degree or for a degree with
honors, shall be examined on as many subjects and in such manner as the said
Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows shall appoint
At the conclusion of every examination of the candidates, the Examiners shall
declare the name of every candidate whom they shall have deemed entitled to any
of the said degrees, and his proficiency in relation to other candidates; and
also the honors which he may have gained in respect of his proficiency in that
department of knowledge in which he is about to graduate; and he shall receive
from the said Chancellor a certificate, under the seal of the said University
of Calcutta and signed by the said Chancellor or Vice-Chancellor, in which the
particulars so stated shall be declared
The said Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, and Fellows shall have power to charge
such reasonable fees for the degrees to be conferred by them, and upon
admission into the said University, and for continuance therein, as they, with
the approbation of the Governor General of India in Council, shall from time to
time see fit to impose. Such fees shall be carried to one General Fee Fund for
the payment of expenses, of the said University, under the directions and
regulations of the Governor General of India in Council to whom the accounts in
income and expenditure in the said University shall once in every year be
submitted for such examination and audit as the said Governor General of India
in Council may direct.