 University of Calcutta is one of the three universities in early modern India, the other two being Bombay (now Mumbai) and Madras University.It was set up by the British in Calcutta in 1857 as a means of spreading western philosophical thought among the elite in India.It also aimed to create, in the words of Lord Macaulay, "a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals and in intellect."