The University of Mumbai is one of India's oldest modern universities and a major public higher-education institution in Maharashtra. Established in 1857 in the era shaped by Wood's Education Dispatch, it was one of the first three universities founded in British India. For much of its history it was known as the University of Bombay; following the official change of the city's name, the university became the University of Mumbai in 1996. Its long institutional life has connected the development of modern higher education in western India with the growth of Mumbai as a commercial, legal, scientific and cultural centre. The university has historic facilities in south Mumbai, including its Fort-area heritage buildings, and a major academic campus at Kalina, commonly known as Vidyanagari. The Kalina campus accommodates departments and centres across humanities, social sciences, sciences, commerce, management, technology and interdisciplinary fields, while the university's wider system includes affiliated colleges and specialized institutions across its jurisdiction. The institution supports postgraduate teaching, doctoral research, examinations, distance and online education, and academic coordination for a very large student community. Mumbai's scale and economic character give the university unusually strong connections with professional life, industry, media, finance, law and public institutions. Departments and affiliated colleges serve both traditional disciplines and emerging areas, enabling the university to combine a historic examination-and-affiliation role with research and advanced teaching. The move of many postgraduate activities to Kalina during the twentieth century created space for modern laboratories, libraries and academic buildings while the Fort campus preserved the university's nineteenth-century architectural identity. Across more than a century and a half, the University of Mumbai has repeatedly adapted its programmes and structures to the changing educational needs of metropolitan Mumbai and the surrounding region. Its institutional scale also makes curriculum coordination, examinations and academic standards across affiliated colleges a major continuing public responsibility.