Jagannath University (JnU) is a public university located in Sadarghat, Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. Founded as Dhaka Brahma School in 1858 and renamed Jagannath School in 1872, the institution was taken over by the Pakistani government in 1968, while Bangladesh was still a part of Pakistan. It opened graduate and post-graduate programmes in 1975 and was approved as a full public university in 2005. In 2022, Jagannath University opened its first residential hall, for female residents only. The university is in the southern part of Dhaka city near the River Buriganga and a new campus of approximately 81 ha (200 acres) is being built at Keraniganj. Total campus area is more than 85 ha (210 acres) with three campuses and a women's residence hall.

History

Dinanath Sen, Prabhaticharan Roy, Anathbandhu Mallik, and Brajasundar Kaitra founded Dhaka Brahma School in 1858, and the university's history began there. The name Jagannath School was given by Kishorilal Chowdhury, the Zamindar of Baliati in Manikganj, who took over the school in 1872 and renamed it after his father. In 1884, it was raised to a second-grade college. Law was one of the first courses introduced. A common management committee administered the school and college until 1887, when the school section was separated to form the independent Kishore Jubilee School, now known as K. L. Jubilee School. The college administration was transferred to a board of trustees in 1907. In the following year, it became a first-grade college. The college started with 48 students. In five years, the roll rose to 396. In 1910, Raja Manmath Roy Chowdhury, the Zamindar of Santosh, Tangail, affiliated the Pramath-Manmath College of Tangail with Jagannath College. With the establishment of the University of Dhaka in 1921, it stopped admission to degree courses and was renamed Jagannath Intermediate College. This status was changed after 28 years in 1949 when it reopened degree classes. The college was taken over by the government in 1968. Jagannath College opened honours and masters programmes in 1975. That year, the government took over it again and transformed it into a postgraduate college. In 1982, the college closed its programmes at the intermediate level. It introduced evening shifts in 1992. It was transformed into Jagannath University in 2005 by passage in the national parliament of the Jagannath University Act-2005.

Ranking

In 2022, The ranking position of Jagannath University is 3399. While the top position from Bangladesh is 1468, the Department of Chemistry ranked 1st among all the universities of Bangladesh according to SCIMAGO Institution ranking. (All information is updated in July 2022 edition)

Academics

Jagannath University has 36 departments under seven faculties and two Institutes. Every department follows the semester system. there are 960 teachers and 19,088 students in Honours, Masters, M.Phil. and Ph.D. programmes.

Faculties

There are six faculties, 36 departments, and two institutes at Jagannath University.

Faculty of Life and Earth Sciences

Faculty of Science

Faculty of Business Studies

Faculty of Arts

Faculty of Law

Faculty of Social Science

Faculty of Fine Arts

List of vice chancellors

Notable alumni

The teachers and students of the then college took an active part in the Language Movement of the early 1950s, the mass movements of the 1960s and the Bangladesh War of Independence in 1971.