India, Dec. 26 -- In a few days when Mumbai welcomes the New Year, we also enter the centenary year of one of its great institutions. Great, for its interesting history but mainly for its contribution to alleviating the suffering of millions of ordinary citizens over the years. Mumbai's King Edward Memorial Hospital turns 100 in 2026. Its founding in 1926 had huge political significance for the city and even the country. It was a hospital built by natives for the natives in response to the British stranglehold over health services. Strangely though, KEM is a rare institution in Mumbai that has escaped a change of its original British name. It's probably because the acronym has become a global brand.

At the turn of the 19thcentury, Bombay...