Maharaja Puma Chandra Autonomous College is one of the premier institutes of higher education in Odisha. The College was set up in the post-independent India way back in July, 1948, during the rule of the popular ministry, with Sri Sarat Chandra Das as the Prime Minister and Maharaja Sri Pratap Chandra Bhanj Deo as the ruling chief of the State of Mayurbhanj. Christened after the Late Maharaja Pur
na Chandra Bhanj Deo who, in his life time, was a great patron of literature and culture, the fledgling college lived, moved and had its beginning on the premises of Maharaja Krushna Chandra High School for a pretty long time. Afterwards, it was felt that the continuance of the College in the M.K.C. With the number of students shooting up every year a great demand was felt for a permanent site. The College considered whether โto be or not to beโ a guest of the solitude offered to it by Chhancha village on the one hand and Takhatpur on the other. Having at last rejected both these uptown rural locations it stepped with a bang in the early sixties into the Maharajaโs palace which had earlier been purchased by the Government of Odisha in 1956. Unlike the sages of yore who chose to teach their pupils in the verdant ambience of nature, the College nurtured its students amidst the very din and bustle of Baripada town itself like Socrates, the eminent philosopher, educating the young in the crowded market place of Athens. But Nature will not let the College alone. The Budhabalanga, purling.melodiously, time and again goads and guides the students to shed their inertia and be for ever intellectually on the move like the flow of its waters. In 1948 the College secured affiliation to Utkal University in Intermediate Arts and Science with a sanctioned strength of 112 and 08 students respectively. The B.A. (Pass) class with a sanctioned strength of 48 students, was opened in the session 1949-50. The courses offered were English, Odia, Economics and Mathematics to which History was added in 1958-59. Honours courses in Economics, Political Science and English were introduced in 1961 , 1963 and 1965 respectively and Odia and Philosophy in 1967. Honours in Sanskrit was offered in 1978-79. The B.Sc. course with Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics as Pass and Honours were started in 1960-61 to which Botany and Zoology were added in 1966. Honours courses in Physics and Chemistry were offered in 1967 and 1968 respectively a