It was founded on 28 September 1905 in Singapore as the King Edward VII College of Medicine and on 8th October 1949, it became the University of Malaya with the merger of the King Edward VII College of Medicine and Raffles College (founded in 1928).
The University of Malaya derives its name from the term ‘Malaya’ as the country was then known. The Carr-Saunders Commission on University Education in Malaya, which recommended the setting up of the university, noted in its Report in 1948: “The University of Malaya would provide for the first time a common centre where varieties of race, religion and economic interest could mingle in joint endeavour … For a University of Malaya must inevitably realise that it is a university for Malaya.”