On May 27, 1909, the Government of India published a Vesting Order and a Scheme for the Management of the Institute in the Gazette of India, officially creating the Indian Institute of Science. The years preceding and following this saw a flurry of activity: designs for new laboratories, construction work to build new departments, plans for instruction, recruitment of faculty, support staff and students, and heated debates on what subjects ought to be taught at the new Institute.
To mark 110 years of IISc’s existence, we’ve put together a series of (courtesy IISc’s Archives, Raja Chandra Urs and the Tata Central Archives) that give us a glimpse of those early days.
The image above is the architect CF Stevens’ drawing of the proposed Main Building, also known as the Library Building. Work on the foundation had begun in 1908 and the Foundation Stone was laid in 1911. According to an early Annual Report, its design was guided by the following idea: “It is due to the dignity of the Institute that at least one of the buildings should have some pretensions to architectural beauty.”
For more photographs in the series, click on the links below:
