You were wrong Shakespeare…

The Bard said “What’s in a name?”

Poor guy was not exposed to the willful ways of RSS and BJP. Little did he know that the names of some towns and cities in India will be changed by his country men….and he was surely unaware that the BJP will insist on reverting back to the original names after more than a century….

Neither did he know about the historical aptitude and attitude of Indians to skillfully change or adapt names to their convenience.

What’s in a name? Why is a name?

Name, since civilization is in place, is kind of an identity proof. Be it of a person or a place. It could probably have been S1, S2 in some parts of the world as it was Julius or Cleopatra in Europe and Shalivahana and Matsyagandha in Indian subcontinent. And then came the identity crisis with Alexander, The Great invading India. He suddenly was known also as Sikander! And then the history was taught as ‘Sikander ne Porous se ki thi ladai…’

So….now you know that changing names is an emotional attribute of Indian psyche. They change names of their women post marriage and now, if one is to believe a commercial of a ceiling fan, men too are willing to change their post wedding.

Coming back to the main point….why are we so perturbed about a gaon going gram?

We might resist a name change as we resist most changes because it takes us out of our comfort zone and we don’t like our cheese to be moved. Didn’t we happily accept other changes?

And forget a Bombay to Mumbai….what about a Cadell Road to Veer Savarkar Marg and Tulsi Pipe Road to Senapati Bapat Marg and a Carmichael Road to Dahanukar Marg and Peddar Road to …..well….. can’t remember! Point is we have witnessed too many changes and faced too many identity crises. Mumbai, especially, has seen too many roads and crossroads change their names, but the Mumbaikars firmly stick to their comfort zone. Century Bazar is history since more than a decade, but the bus conductor still cuts a ticket for ‘Cenchuri Baajaar’ and reminds you of the stop with the same name when you get there.

Governments can spend crores in renaming cities and grams, but we will continue to use the name we want. When Alexander couldn’t prevent it ions ago or Olexandre couldn’t stop a Rani from calling him Sikander centuries later in ‘Queen’….. do you seriously think people will overnight start calling Gurgaon Gurugram……Kolkata is still Calcutta to most and Bengaluru is still Bangalore — even to auto correct!

What Shakespeare didn’t know is….Name is like a sanctum of a temple to most Indians who are extremely upset if their name is spelt wrong, pronounced wrong or God forbid someone actually addresses you with a wrong name….

If he did…..well…..like they say…. rest is history!

Thanks for reading…

Shruti Pandit — the whackier than the whackiest of them all…media professional

This first appeared on LinkedIn