Dayanand Anglo-Vedic (DAV) College, Lahore

The Dayanand Anglo-Vedic school opened in Lahore on 1 June 1886, set up by the Arya Samaj in memory of its founder, Swami Dayanand Saraswati, who had died three years earlier. Wikipedia names Mahatma Hansraj (1864 to 1938) and Gurudatta Vidyarthi as its founders. It later grew into DAV College, Lahore; the sources we opened give no firm date for that step.

Hansraj was principal for 25 years. In 1893 the Arya Samaj in Punjab split. One side, led by Hansraj and Lala Lajpat Rai, kept control of DAV College. The other, led by Pandit Lekh Ram and Lala Munshi Ram (later Swami Shraddhanand), formed a separate body.

The Sikh side

The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism says the Sikhs of this period faced a bitter religious controversy begun by Hindu critics, especially Arya Samajists, and that in the debate over whether Sikhs were Hindus the Arya Samajists enthusiastically supported the conservatives.

The career of Bhai Jawahir Singh Kapur (1859 to 1910) shows how close and how bitter it was. The Encyclopaedia says he was one of the original promoters of the DAV College in 1885 and secretary of its fund-raising committee. He left the Arya Samaj on 25 November 1888, at its annual meeting in Lahore, after Pandit Guru Dutt of Government College spoke in provocative terms against the Sikh Gurus. He then wrote polemics against the Arya Samaj.

The Sikh community's own college came from a separate line of effort. The Encyclopaedia says Khalsa Diwan Amritsar first proposed it in 1883, an establishment committee was formed in 1890, and the foundation stone of Khalsa College, Amritsar was laid on 5 March 1892.

After 1947

• The Lahore campus served as a refugee camp until 1952. An Islamic charity then used it as a medical and law college, and in 1958 it became Government Islamia College Civil Lines (The Tribune).
• The college itself was relocated to Ambala in 1948 (The Tribune) and is known there as DAV College (Lahore).
• Majid Sheikh writes that the Anjuman Himayat-e-Islam took over the Lahore property and that the DAV name stayed on the main building for years.

Where it stands: the DAV College Managing Committee, which Wikipedia says Hansraj founded, now runs hundreds of schools and colleges across India. Wikipedia counts more than 800 schools in one place and over 900 in another, so the figure is unsettled.