The man who spearheaded the campaign to establish the first Biochemistry Department in the Indian subcontinent was a bright young gold medalist named Kamaluddin Ahmad. Holding the position of a Reader (current Associate Professor rank) in the Chemistry Department Dr. Ahmad was able to convince the Syndicate members of the University to establish the Department of Biochemistry. Professor Mokarram Hossain Khundker, the Chairman of the Chemistry Department actively supported the idea and Md. Ibrahim the then Vice Chancellor of the University supported enthusiastically.
The Department of Biochemistry started functioning as a full pledged department of the University from 1 July 1957, with Dr. Kamaluddin Ahmad as its first Head of the department. The department started its journey in the present building, with an enrolment of 10-12 preliminary M.Sc. students. Soon after the initial years, Dr. Kamaluddin Ahmad and his associates felt the need to open a three year B.Sc. honors program in the year 1963 and the program strated with twenty brightest students. In the academic session 1995-1996, the traditional three-year B.Sc. (Honors) program was changed to a four-year B.S. (Honors) as a terminal degree.
To keep pace with changing times, the department was renamed in 2001 as the “Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology”.