Auxilium Convent
8 Sayed Amir Ali Avenue
Park Circus Kolkata 700017,
West Bengal
Park Circus was opened in the year 1966 as a transit house by the then Provincal Mother Teresa Merlo. The Pioneers of this house were Sr. Cecilia Doyle and Sr. Hilda Barragan who stayed in Dum Dum for a month and went to and fro, getting the house ready. The first Superior of the house was Sr. Margaret Opezzo.
There was already a school from nursery to class III with 300 students existing under the name St. Victor School; and in January 1967, it was renamed as Auxilium Convent School. Auxilium Convent School had pre-primary and Elementary classes.
The commercial school began in Park Circus in 1970. It was well attended by the girls of Park Circus area. Initially a sister was in charge but when she was transferred Mrs. Ghosh an efficient teacher from Dumford School took charge. The girls appeared for the exams through Dumford School and got good secretarial jobs in various offices. In 1988 commercial school was closed down due to insufficient number of students.
The Park Circus house provided accommodation for all our sisters who came to Calcutta for purchases and other works and who journeyed by train. The sisters attended mass and Sunday school at the oratory of Don Bosco Park Circus and Chinese chapel at Tengra. On Sunday evenings grown up girls of the Parish came to the house for catechism classes. The chaplain of the community was Fr. Atilio Colussi from 1967 to 1987 till his death.
From 1977 to 1982 Sr. Catherine Das for Bengali Medium school and Sr. Magdaline Caspani for the dispensary, went to Auxilium Parish Gobra to render help the Salesian Fathers. They went up and down until a new community was established there in 1982.
From 1999 a sudden decline in the number of students took place due to mushrooming of schools in the locality, no scope for furthering the education and lessening of children in the family. So the school continued to function as a pre-primary school with an average strength of 150 students. Today we have Nursery of two sections and K.G. of one section.
Another activity of the house is parish catechesis. One sister goes to take catechism for the parish children at Queen of the mission every Sunday. House visiting is not done regularly but as and when needs arises sisters visit the families of children, sick and the aged.
A group of young boys and girls who are nurses in various hospitals here and who belong to Jesus Youth come to our house every Sunday for their regular meetings, prayer experience , adorations and discussions and at times even on week days they have adorations for special graces. Though we do not join them regularly we do take part in their gatherings occasionally.
There is a vibrant group of co-operators who are very experienced and want to contribute their share for the growth and well being of the young and the needy. They engage in different activities to raise fund for sponsoring childrens education and helping the orphanages, Ashalayam etc.