Re-re-re-naming, rrrrrrrrrr – naming of towns in UP by SP: BSP fumes!
My name is? wait for the new government!
Lucknow: according to a number of reports in the press, among all the agendas on Akhilesh’s table is the serious business of renaming towns and districts in UP. UP has seen similar binging by Mayawati who seemed to believe that when you rename something, you change it radically. Bombay, Madras, Bangalore, the illustrious cities have been through these transformations so why not change the name of your little lane and call it ‘Paradise Path’, if it helps remove the piles of garbage from the street corners. Does it? Try and see if it does despite the clean image and piety it evokes.
So when you travel to UP the next time make sure to be au courant or else you will find yourself deposited in an unfamiliar place.
Imagine a dialogue between a traveler and a ticketing agent in Patna!
‘I want a ticket for Bombay’, you tell him.
‘Sir, I hope you are aware you are asking to travel to the past. We don’t include that in our services’, may be his reply.
In a great story of doing and undoing, the Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh today renamed eight districts which had been earlier named by Mayawati, leaving the BSP supremo fuming. The decision to change the names was taken at a cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav. Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj Nagar will be known as Amethi, while Rambai Nagar will be called Kanpur Dehat. The names of Bheem Nagar, Prabuddha Nagar and Panchseel Nagar have been changed to Sambhal, Shamli and Hapur respectively.
Changing names: changing faces!
Similarly, Kanshiram Nagar, Mahamaya Nagar and JP Nagar will be known as Kasganj, Hathras and Amroha respectively. The cabinet noted that since the names created confusion, people and public representatives were demanding restoration of old names. The name of the 105-year-old King George’s Medical University (KGMU), which was changed to Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj Medical University during the BSP regime, was also restored.
The alumni of KGMU are working in the US, Canada, Australia and England and know the university by its old name. Reacting to the development, Mayawati accused the ruling SP of changing “with an ill will” the nomenclatures of districts named after saints, gurus and dalit icons during her regime.
“New districts were created during BSP regime and named after dalit and OBC icons so that they always remain a source of inspiration for the society,” the former chief minister said in a statement. “The decision of the SP government is very painful and condemnable. I think that (by doing so) SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and his Chief Minister son Akhilesh have got their names written in black letters in the pages of history,” she added.
So all over again, Mayawati talks of names, names in ‘black letters’. Reflecting on the names of the two great leaders, Mulayam’s full name translates as an oxymoron – ‘soft or pulpy lion’. As for Mayawati, isn’t it ironic that the great heeder of the hard social reality of UP is named Maya, meaning various shades of unreality, including hallucination!
Time these two reflected on their own names and considered changing them!