The Somaiya Vidyavihar Complex was founded in 1959 by late Shri K.J. Somaiya (1902-1999). Endowed with a sharp business acumen, a balanced perspective and a social bent of mind, Karamshibhai set up the Somaiya Trust in 1953 for furthering his dream of shaping young minds through quality education. For this purpose he bought a large area of land at Ghatkopar, then considered to be distant, meagrely populated suburb of Mumbai. Today Ghatkopar has mushroomed into a formidable residential centre. Karamshibhai laid the foundation for SOMAIYA VIDYAVIHAR in 1959. Construction began in September 1959. Karamshibhai supervised construction personally, motivating and egging the workers on. In a short span of 6 months construction of the first building, which today houses the KJ Somaiya College of Arts & Commerce, was completed. The first class was held on June 21, 1960.

In just five decades it has grown into a large educational complex with 34 institutions catering to diverse fields of education such as Humanities, Engineering, Education, Medicine, Management, Pure Sciences and Mass Communication, with more than 27000 students and 1700 teaching faculty on a throbbing 65 acre campus!