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St Bonaventure High School, Hyderabad

In the years between 1920s and early 1930s the missionary establishments in the southern Indian subcontinent laid foundations for a school in Hyderabad run by the church to impart education to the masses. It was, however, during the years of the partition and the formation of the nation of Pakistan (1945-1948), Archilles Meersman, a parish priest, born to a Dutch mother and a Belgian father, at the Franciscan seminary at Karachi, built the new school. With deeply rooted Franciscan ideologies, Archilles named the school after the saint Bonaventure of Bagnoregio. Although some suggest that the school was named after the Rt. Rev Bonaventure Patrick Paul, former bishop of Hyderabad. It was later given the status of a high school after the partition and was formally called St. Bonaventure’s High School.

[Source: Text and images: Hyderabad Revisited by Momin Bullo | Coordinates: Waheed Chandio]