Hyde Park Gardens
Kilpauk Medical College Campus, Kilpauk |
Captain Dr. Srinivasa Murti founded the Government School of Indian Medicine (GSIM) in 1925 and became its first Principal. The College needed a place to function from and help came from Parthasarathy Ramarayaningar, the Rajah of Paanagal (1866-1928). He belonged to a wealthy zamindar family of Andhra that owned several properties in Madras. Hyde Park Gardens was one of them.
Captain Srinivasa Murti later founded the Indian Medical Practitioners’ Co-operative Society which functions in Adyar. The GSIM was reorganised in 1947 and out of this came the College of Indian Medicine which in 1953 became the College of Integrated Medicine. This was closed in 1960 and Hyde Park Gardens was made over to the newly established Kilpauk Medical College. The College of Indian Medicine was revived in the 1970s as the Arignar Anna Government Hospital of Indian Medicine and functions from Anna Nagar.
A statue of Captain Srinivasa Murti still adorns the Kilpauk campus. The Rajah of Paanagal who was Prime Minister of the Madras Presidency between 1921 and 1928 is remembered by name and with a statue in Panagal (sic) Park. One of the blocks in the KMC is also named after him.
Hyde Park Gardens is a two-storeyed house with the first floor surmounted by a sloping roof. Two corners of the building are octagonal in shape and contain staircases. Long verandahs on both floors protect the interiors from the glare of the midday sun. The upper verandah is topped by a sloping Mangalore roof supported on slender wooden posts with decorated braces. (Courtesy: KalamKriya.)
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