BOMBAY: India’s most cosmopolitan city, Bombay, is changing its name back to the centuries old “Mumbai” in a move that got a mixed response from residents on Tuesday Nov. 21.

Some citizens welcomed a federal decision to revert the name to the indigenous Mumbai as a delayed assertion of ethnic identity, but others feared a loss of its present-day character.

Chief Minister Manohar Joshi, whose government decided in May to rename India’s business capital without the federal government agreement, was jubilant and ordered sweets distributed to reporters at a weekly briefing where he made the announcement.

For nearly 30 years, Joshi’s Shiv Sena party has vigorously demanded that the city be renamed Mumbai as it is known in the Marathi language, recognizing the aspirations of the local Maharashtra people, There naming was one of Shiv Sena’s campaign promises ahead of March state assembly elections that swept the party’s coalition with the national opposition Bharatiya Janata Party to power in Maharashtra, where Bombay is located.

“It’s a very good move,” said Y.D. Phadke, former chairman of the Maharashtra State Board for Literature and Culture.

“Though delayed, the decision is correct,” said the sociologist whose book, “Politics and Language,” explored the rationale behind the emotive power of the demand.

“There was really no point in continuing with it,” he said. “There’s no sanctity to the word ‘Bombay’ “Burma has changed (o ‘Myanmar’ and Peking to ‘Beijing’ and enter body reused to it.

Unlike “Patel” or “Mehta,” the set name “Mumbaikar,” of people originally hailing from Bombay, is not immediately identifiable to many.

In Bombay, home to over 11 million people, many of them migrants seeking their fame and fortunes in India’s entre portage by the sea, there are just three “Mumbaikars” in the telephone directory.

The city was called Mumbai before the Portuguese gave it away in dowry 400 vears ago to British King Charles II, when he married Catherina Braganza.

“The renaming is not in itself anything to get terribly disturbed about,” said historian Mariam Dossal, “What could be disturbing is if this arm flexing carries a hidden threat to other communities. That is objectionable. * For many Bombay residents, Shiv Sena’s determination to change the name of the city is inextricably tied up with the party’s violent origins in the late 1960s, when it launched an aggressive agitation against “outsiders,” demanding more jobs for the “sons of the soil.”

“But from the beginning the city has always been a mix of different communities, as it has grown,” said Dossal.

When Shiv Sena came to power in the Bombay Municipal Corporation decade ago, the first thing it did was change Bombay’s name to Mumbai and plant a plaque in front of the

Gateway of India.

I consider this a most retrograde step,” said lawyer Iqbal Chagla on Tuesday. “I never thought the central government would be a party to destroying the unique and distinctive nature of this great metropolis I hope they will rethink this.”

Previous governments seeking to officially change the city’s name have seen their efforts blocked by the federal government. There was no immediate information available on when the name change would take effect, but the official letterheads of some organizations, like the London based Hindu a trading family or South Africa’s diplomatic mission, already bear the new

Some people thought changing the name would make very little difference, The imposing Victorian Gothic structures the British left behind may be dwarfed by today’s concrete jungle of skyscrapers, but many are still known by their Georgian or Edwardian names, said Sadashiv Tinaikar, formerly the city administration’s top official: “People still refer to the streets and roads by their old names,” Tinaikar said, “People will continue to speak of it by the name they are comfortable with.”

[P.L.11/24/95].

Article extracted from this publication >> December 1, 1995