The Calcutta University Act came into force on 24 January 1857, and a 41-member Senate was formed as the policy-making body of the university. The land for the establishment of the university was given by Maharaja Maheshwar Singh Bahadur, who was a Maharaja of Darbhanga. When the university was first established it had a jurisdiction from Lahore to Rangoon and Ceylon, the largest of any Indian university. Calcutta University was the first university east of Suez to teach European classics, English literature, European and Indian philosophy and Occidental and Oriental history. The first medical school in Asia, the Calcutta Medical College, was affiliated with the university in 1857. The first college for women in India, Bethune College, is affiliated with the university.