Maharajah's College

1879 college founded by the Vizianagaram royal family, one of the region's oldest institutions

Maharajah's College was founded in 1879 by the rulers of the Vizianagaram princely state, making it one of the older educational institutions in Andhra Pradesh. The campus buildings — built in the late 19th and early 20th centuries — are architecturally interesting: colonial administrative style adapted to the Indian climate, with covered walkways, high ceilings, and decorative elements that mix British and local traditions.

The college is a working academic institution and not a tourist site, but the campus is pleasant to walk through and the older buildings are worth seeing. It sits in the centre of town, a short walk from the fort, and the neighbourhood around it has the dense, layered quality of an Indian town that has been continuously inhabited and continuously built upon for a long time.

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A story
The Vizianagaram Maharajahs were unusually enthusiastic patrons of education — the college was founded in 1879 partly because the ruler of the time, Pusapati Vijayarama Gajapathi Raju, had been impressed by a visit to Benares where he saw what Western-model institutions were doing for local elites. He hired British professors, endowed scholarships, and built a campus that combined colonial Gothic with local design elements. The institution outlasted the princely state by decades and is now an autonomous college affiliated with Andhra University.