Sharing Indo-Danish Historical Connections with Serampore College

On August 23 Danish Cultural Institute’s headquarter had the pleasure of a visit by a delegation from Serampore College in Kolkata, together with curators and historians from the Danish National Museum

The Danish National Museum has a long collaboration with institutions in India on the research project ”The Serampore Initiative”, among others Serampore College in the West Bengal. The purpose of this initiative is documenting and preserving the physical cultural heritage from the Danish period in Serampore (1755 to 1845) and to contribute to new knowledge of the joint Indo-Danish history.

In 1818 Serampore College, originally established in 1800 as a Mission, was granted the status of university, and thereby becoming India’s first university. The College in India was considered the third Danish University, the other two being in Copenhagen and at Kiel. The purpose of the College was to give an education in Arts and Sciences to all students irrespective of their caste, colour and creed.

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The occasion of the Serampore delegation’s visit to Copenhagen is the College’s celebration next year of 200 years of the establishment of Serampore College, and in this celebrating the connections to Denmark.

To mark this grand milestone, the College is looking forward and making visions for the coming decade. One project for the celebrations is a new building, that will serve as a frame for a Centre for Integrated Studies at the College. Considering the needs of the society today, the new centre will research within contemporary issues in India. The vision of the College is to look into new ideas for city development and empowerment of minorities.

The delegation visited Copenhagen to explore partnerships and funding for the new centre.

Photo: DCI.