Page 53 - Demo

Their impetus laid an important ground for modern science in India.The Vizianagaram Laboratory, with instruments brought from Europe, was set up with a generous donation of Rs.25,000 from the Maharaja of Vizianagaram. The laboratory was 141 feet long and 66 feet wide, with three large central rooms, flanked by five smaller rooms on each of the sides. One could say that this donation contributed in a crucial way to Indian science.The Pusapati family, it appears, practised as they preached to whatever extent they could. Although women in the Pusapati clan often married in from other families, they quickly imbibed the progressive ethos. Maharani Appala Kondayamma who married the Maharaja of Rewa, returned to her natal home after the early death of her husband. She was instrumental in carrying forward the legacy of Maharaja Anand Gajapathi. The great aunt of PVG Raju, she started, in 1904, one of the earliest maternity hospitals in southern India; Gosha Hospital in Vizianagaram. Unencumbered by the class and caste-based division that can be seen, especially in matters of maternity health and women's healthcare, Gosha Hospital was clean, sanitary, and staffed with a bevy of the finest doctors and treated everyone to its range of services and treatments. Gosha Hospital was the second one of its kind in Andhra Pradesh, the first being Kugler's hospital in Guntur, set up by missionaries in 1897. The Victoria Zenana hospital in Hyderabad, a far larger princely state, was only built in 1906 and became operational in 1908.Maharani Appala Kondayamma was responsible for building a protected water supply system for Vizianagaram town in 1911 at the personal cost of two and a half lakh rupees which were taken from her estate; another first. Vizianagaram 43