A commemorative postage stamp on the Centenary of Lady Hardinge Medical College (LHMC), a medical college for women located in New Delhi :

Issued by India

Issued on Sep 23, 2016

Issued for : Department of Posts is pleased to release a commemorative postage stamp on Lady Hardinge Medical College.

Credits :
Stamp / FDC / Cancellation cachet : Smt. Nenu Gupta

Type : Stamp, Mint Condition

Colour : Multi Colour

Denomination : 500 Paise

Stamps Printed : 0.409 million

Printing Process : Wet Offset

Printer : Security Printing Press, Hyderabad

About : 

• The Lady Hardinge Medical College, New Delhi has had the privilege of imparting medical education to thousands of doctors that are now practicing all over the world. It is, incidentally, one of the few medical colleges in the world that is only for girls.
  
• The idea of having a medical college for women was formulated in the mind of Lady Hardinge in 1912 who observed that only a few Indian women had adopted for pursuing the profession of medicine. She then proposed to establish at Delhi a medical college with its attached hospital in which women would be taught by women to attend on women. It was also proposed to attach to the college and hospital a separate institution for training nurses. The Plan included setting up a college of 100 students, a hospital of 150 beds, and, a training school for about fifty nurses. Funds were, accordingly, mobilized for the project and Lady Hardinge laid the foundation stone of the college on 17^th March 1914, few days before her departure for England where she died in the same year.
  
• Lady Hardinge Medical College was opened on Friday, February 8, 1916. The inauguration function was an emotional moment for Lord Hardinge. He spoke with much feeling. He also made a touching appeal to the women of India including wives of Governors and Lieutenant Governors to collect more funds for this project.
  
• The foundation stone of the College of Nursing was laid by Lady Chelmsford in February 1916. It is the oldest school of nursing in Delhi. Opened in the beginning with the services of two English sisters, the college now takes over 60 students in two batches each year.
  
• The annual admissions to the Medical College in the first year were 16. The MBBS course then lasted 7 years inclusive of two years of premedical training. The college received affiliation with Punjab University from September 1916. Students had to travel to King Edward Medical College Lahore for taking their examinations after completing their curriculum at Lady Hardinge. In 1950, after independence, the college was affiliated with University of Delhi, and the number of seats was increased to 60 in 1955, and later to 130 in 1970. Currently it admits 200 students in MBBS program since 2012.
  
• The college has two attached hospitals, the Shrimati Sucheta Kriplani Hospital for adults and the Kalawati Saran Hospital for children.
  
• Ever since its inception, the college has awarded more than 6,000 undergraduate degrees and more than 1,200 post graduate degrees and diplomas in various disciplines of medicine.
  
• The vision of Lady Hardinge at the inception of this college was as follows:
  “India’s most pressing problem at the present day was to secure a healthy and happy population. I regard this college as a pioneer institution which would ultimately lead to the wide diffusion of medical and sanitary knowledge by training Indian women of the proper class as doctors, health officers and nurses.”
  
• The vision has been fulfilled and today, the graduates of this institution have made a name for themselves in every field of medicine and nursing not only in India, but in almost all parts of the world. Lady Hardinge Medical College is completing 100 years of establishment in 2016.
  
• Text : Based on the material received from proponent.

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