Loreto College starts new PG wing with Swraj Paul’s donation

Thanks to a generous donation from London-based NRI industrialist Lord Swraj Paul, the 104-year-old prestigious Loreto College here has added a new floor to its heritage building for offering Masters degree courses from this month. 

The British peer’s wife, Aruna Paul, studied at the college and he made the donation to as a “token of appreciation”.

“Aruna studied there, taught there. It is a great institution plus it is Kolkata, my second home. It is a token of our appreciation,” Paul said on Sunday.

Named ‘Mary Ward-Lady Aruna Paul Wing on the new fourth floor, the section houses a new postgraduate department and library. Classes for the first MA in English course with affiliation to the University of Calcutta will begin this month. “The new wing was constructed at a cost of Rs 3.50 crores with equal contributions from Lord Paul, University Grants Commission (UGC) and the state government. The construction took two years,” college principal Christine Coutinho said.

“We are grateful to the family for being generous. As part of our centenary celebrations we had planned to expand MA in English and Lord Paul came to our rescue with funds,” she said, adding that Lady Paul had studied in the women’s college during the fifties.

The college now has plans to add another wing to the fourth floor of the U-shaped building with another round of donations from the Paul family.