Name Changing States

Politics play a dirty role in every decision of the Governments in Centre and States. Changing the name of a city or state is one of these many dirty games. It is understandable that localisation of the names is to respect the language and culture. But when even that local names are changed when governments change tell the malafide intentions. Uttranchal to Uttrakhand is the best example. Everyone is put under heavy strain with these name change tamashas. It must stop immediately.

The Times of India writes (24 October 2009)

Just when you were getting used to Bengaluru, they've decided to add another tongue-twister to your vocabulary. Orissa is Odisha and
Oriya is now Odia. And for anyone who says `what's in a name' ask director-producer Karan Johar who was forced to not just issue a public apology on the use of `Bombay' but also add a disclaimer to his film `Wake Up Sid'.

In times where being politically correct means not asking uncomfortable questions, the change in nomenclature was approved by the Union Cabinet on Wednesday without discussion. It will get Parliament's nod soon enough.

While Shiv Sena turned Bombay to Mumbai and similar political compulsions dictated changing Calcutta to Kolkata, our history is replete with examples of regional demands for name changing -- whether it is state, language, street or chowk. Erasing fancy sounding British names to earthy Indian ones is a favoured political pastime though it is unclear what dividend it pays.

The proposed change will now require an amendment to the first and eighth schedule of the Constitution which is likely to come up in Parliament soon.

The Orissa assembly had moved a resolution in August to change the state's name to Odisha and its official language from Oriya to Odia, saying the names had been used wrongly. Chief minister Naveen Patnaik moved the resolution in the House which was approved by a voice vote.

Officials said the state was keen to change its name owing to disparities in pronunciation due to the wrong spelling of the state's name. It is written as Udisa in Hindi and Orissa in English.

Major cities that have been renamed after Independence include Kanpur (formerly Cawnpore), Thiruvananthapuram (Trivandrum), Mumbai (Bombay), Chennai (Madras), Kolkata (Calcutta), Pune (Poona) and Kochi (Cochin).

Stop Attack Against Migrants in India

Our politicians and political parties do not have any right to speak about the attacks against Indians abroad. They are the ones who encourage attack against the fellow Indians in their states. Maharashtra politicians attack Biharis who come to Mumbai for writing all India exams and chasing jobs. As long as these kinds of attacks happen in India we don't have much moral right to stop those happening against Indians abroad.

The Times of India writes (1 October 2009)

The saffron combine has dusted up an old agenda ahead of the Maharashtra polls. It wants to end migration to Mumbai and other urban centres in the
state. This follows the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena's (MNS) threat to put in place a permit system to regulate migration to India's financial capital. The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), a member of the ruling coalition, joined this populist bandwagon when it pushed reservation of 80 per cent jobs for locals. Now the BJP-Shiv Sena have upped the ante by including a similar demand in their manifesto. Thanks to the obsession with carving out vote banks, Raj Thackeray's extremist demands have now become mainstream.

The problem, however, is that it is flagrantly unconstitutional. Our Constitution guarantees the right of all Indian citizens to travel, work and reside anywhere in the country. Political parties that want to contest elections are legally bound to respect the Constitution. Exceptions can't be made for the BJP, Sena, MNS or NCP. The concern of these parties for the welfare of Maharashtrians is no doubt justified, but the prescription to improve their lot is misplaced. The suggested 'permit system' would tear apart the social and economic fabric of Mumbai and Maharashtra. Mega cities and economies across time and place have been built with the sweat of migrants. Mumbai is no exception. Its history and identity can't be altered by fiat from political parties.

The Congress-NCP government, having been in office for two successive terms, ought to take a large part of the blame for the state's worries. But the saffron combine, instead of raising issues of governance and there are so many of them wants to campaign with banal slogans. The alliance hopes to check the influence of MNS, an offshoot of the Sena, with a matching rhetoric. It may suit Sena's immediate interests to force a political discourse that pits Maharashtrian against non-Maharashtrian. But the BJP, which has a pan-Indian presence and wants to expand that, will pay a price for backing the Sena's narrow political vision.

The Congress and the NCP may have criticised the saffron combine's position on migration, but they too are guilty of facilitating a political climate that encourages chauvinist identity politics. The Congress-NCP government has all along winked at MNS's hate campaigns since its growth is expected to weaken the Sena. Such agendas, even if raised only as election rhetoric, can build momentum for disastrous policy changes. If Maharashtra enforces a permit system there will be retaliatory sanctions from other states, which poses problems for the country at large. Political parties must not allow temporary (and doubtful) electoral gains to override the interests of the country and its people.

Thining Trouble in Gorkhaland?

The fight is not yet over. Gorkhas are trying to secure a land of their own in India by demanding Gorkhaland. The government has been elusive for the past two decades. It gave autonomous authority but that was not satisfactory for the separate state loving Gorkhas. Now there is a truce between the fighters and the state. It needs to be watched how long it is going to last.

The Times of India writes (13 August 2009)


Nearly two decades after it came into existence, the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC) is set to become history. The Centre, the West Bengal government and the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) have, after their latest round of talks, decided in principle to scrap the DGHC Act, 1988. This is a step forward in resolving the crisis that has kept the Darjeeling hills on the boil for several months.

The Gorkha hill council was created after a violent agitation for a separate Gorkhaland spearheaded by the Gorkha National Liberation Front (GNLF) and its leader Subhas Ghising. But once the hill council was formed, it rapidly became Ghising's fiefdom. Since 2004, there were no elections held in the DGHC and it was accused of rampant corruption. This led to a breakaway faction, the GJM, resurrecting the demand for a Gorkhaland and scrapping of the hill council. A series of bandhs followed and in many parts of Darjeeling the West Bengal government's writ was no longer heeded. Doing away with the hill council will at least address one of the major demands of the Gorkhas.

Another of GJM's demands was Sixth Schedule status for Darjeeling. This would have given Darjeeling greater autonomy and legislative and executive powers similar to those enjoyed by district councils in tribal areas and in the north-east. However, there is plenty of opposition to this idea in parts of Darjeeling as it would mean a tribal council running the affairs of non-tribals. The demand for Sixth Schedule status has been dropped after the decision to scrap the hill council was taken.

So far so good. Now comes the difficult part: How to tackle the demand for a separate Gorkhaland? It seems that the Centre has told the Gorkhas that a separate state was untenable because it did not have the backing of either West Bengal or Parliament. At the same time, the Lok Sabha MP from Darjeeling, Jaswant Singh, has reiterated that the creation of a state is the main demand of the Gorkhas. The Gorkhaland issue needs to be settled once and for all. An interlocutor has been appointed to carry forward the discussions. It is important that all issues are discussed threadbare and autonomy, that is acceptable to all parties, and even the option of statehood are put on the table. There are justifiable concerns about Darjeeling's strategic importance as well as its viability as a separate state. But if demands for Gorkhaland continue to flare up every few years, we can't afford a temporary solution. Past experience shows that new, smaller states aren't doing so badly.