MUMBAI, May 4 -- Billionaire realtor and Maharashtra minister Mangal Prabhat Lodha's proposal to rename KEM Hospital, the state's largest public health facility, has outraged the medical community, including several in the diaspora who were trained there. Decolonization is an ongoing process in much of the world--from toppling Cecil Rhodes's statue at Oxford to renaming monuments like Flora Fountain in Mumbai or Connaught Place in Delhi. Up next is a plan to rename Civil Lines-those British-era enclaves of order and tranquility amid the chaos of Indian cities. But setting aside the semantic contortions of turning King Edward Memorial Hospital into Kaushalyashresth Eklavya Memorial Hospital, there is still something tin-eared about the renaming. To mark KEM's centennial year in 2026, its alumni has published a lavishly-produced scholarly compendium of the institution's history and achievements-'Annals of Seth Gordhandas Sunderdas Medical College and KEM Hospital: Nationalism, Foundation and Growth'. It recounts the story of how the institution came about. Medical education and care in pre-Independence India were entirely controlled by the British Army through its branch, the Indian Medical Service (IMS). Calcutta, Madras and Bombay were the seat of medical education but native physicians who graduated from these institutions were not allowed to teach. When the brilliant KN Bahadurji, one of the first Indians to obtain a Doctor of Medicine (MD) degree from the University of London, was denied appointment as professor of medicine at Grant Medical College in Bombay, he asked his fellow Parsi Sir Pherozeshah Mehta, then Bombay's municipal commissioner, to establish a new medical facility in the city that would be staffed by Indians and break the monopoly of the IMS. Bahadurji died before this could be realized, but three disparate events set the long-awaited change in motion. In 1902, a 28-year-old leader of Bombay's wealthy Bhatia community, Gordhandas Sunderdas Mulji, died. Following the bitter wrangling over his will the Bombay High Court appointed renowned barrister Chimanlal Setalvad (activist Teesta Setalvad's great grandfather) as arbitrator. Setalvad set up a trust comprising himself, Sir Pherozshah and vice-chancellor of Bombay University Sir Narayan Chandavarkar. Around this time-in 1907-- the British government transferred the responsibility of vaccination, medical relief and primary education to the Municipal Corporation of Bombay enabling Indians like Sir Pherozeshah and eminent physicians who were part of the municipal corporation, to take decisions about the city's healthcare. And in 1910, King Edward VII died in far-off London from severe bronchial issues. The king's death at 49 prompted the setting up of hospitals as memorials to him across the Empire. Bombay, Poona, Sholapur, Lahore, Karnal, Singapore, Perth, Adelaide, Bermuda, Kuala Lumpur and Falkland Islands all have either a King Edward Memorial Hospital or a Medical University. On June 22, 1910, the Bombay Presidency King Edward Memorial Association held its first general meeting to discuss the proposed memorial hospital. It was presided by the governor of Bombay and its executive committee included the Jewish philanthropist Sir David Sassoon, Sir Dinshaw Petit, Sir Dorabji Tata, Dinshaw Wacha, Sir Vithaldas Thackersey, Chimanlal Setalvad, Dr Sir Bhalchandra Krishna and MA Jinnah. Several of Bombay's wealthy families stepped forward to contribute to the building of a public hospital-Sir Currrimbhoy Ebrahim, Mangaldas Nathubhoy and the estate of Dr Habib Ismail Jan Mahomed to name a few. But the biggest donation came from the family of Gordhandas Sunderdas Mulji whose affairs had been settled by the arbitration efforts of Chimanlal Setalvad. They donated Rs.14,50,000 to build a medical college adjacent to the hospital in Mulji's name with one caveat: "The professors and teachers to be employed at the college should be properly qualified independent Indian gentlemen, not in government service." The KEM and GS Medical College centennial memorial volume reports that the Bombay Presidency King Edward Memorial Association offered 50,000 square yards of land at Parel, not far from the lab where the maverick Russian-French bacteriologist Waldemar Haffekine, had developed vaccines against cholera and the bubonic plague. British architect GW Wittet drew the plans for the hospital, his sketches relying on Florence Nightingale's 'Notes on Hospitals', to ensure sufficient natural ventilation. "KEM is the first hospital in India to be staffed and controlled by non-official members of the Indian medical profession. It is, in its way, a microcosm of the whole future of India," wrote a newspaper editorial upon the hospital's inauguration on February 15, 1926. G S Medical College and KEM then in fact became first of the medical institutions in the country to mount a decolonization campaign. The other striking thing about KEM's history is the compact between the city and its wealthy across communities enabling municipal excellence. The great and the good coming together to create an institution that was truly egalitarian. According to the 2026 Hurun's rich list, Mumbai has 95 billionaires, the highest concentration in India, but one would be hard-pressed today to find them contributing to create a similar municipal institution of excellence that serves all classes. Part of the anger among the alumni over the proposed renaming of KEM has been the slow abandonment of public health institutions. Data from the 80th round survey of household consumption on health released by the National Statistical Office (NSO) last week says only a fifth of patients in Maharashtra go to public hospitals for help, the lowest in the country, even as private healthcare cost grew at double the inflation rate in the state. "The trust and credibility of institutions like KEM has eroded because the felt experience is often so bad and these are systemic issues that need tackling. Name change will not improve one patient outcome," says Dr Sanjay Nagral who has spent the better part of his career serving in public hospitals. In a widely-shared post US-based doctor and filmmaker Ravi Godse who trained at KEM, challenged government to start another centre of excellence instead of renaming KEM. "Why not open a trauma centre in Konkan and call it Konkan Emergency Medical, and build it to such level that King Edward himself would crawl out of his grave and stand in front of it in awe." Mere activity, he insisted, is not a substitute for achievement....