Bangalore Has Just Been Bangaloored!

The latest casualty in the name change mania raging across the country (India) since the last decade is Bangalore, along with 10 other cities in the state of Karnataka. Henceforth Bangalore will be called as Bengalooru alongside Mysore - Mysooru, Mangalore - Mangalooru, Shimoga - Shivamogga, Belgaum - Belagavi, Gulbarga - Kalburgi, Hubli - Hubbali, Hospet - Hosapete, Chikamaglur - Chikkamagalooru, Bellary - Ballary, and Tumkur - Tumakooru.

Before Bangalore became Bengalooru, the country saw Trivandrum becoming Thiruvanthapuram along with seven other cities in Kerala whose names were also changed at the same time, such as Bombay becoming Mumbai, Madras becoming Chennai, and Calcutta becoming Kolkata.

The reason why this is being done now is because of those damned Brits. They ruled this country for nearly 190 years (1757-1947) and yet never developed the intrinsic muscles necessary to pronounce tongue twisters like Bendakaaloru, Mahisasurahuru, Mumbadevi, etc., and hence they, following the wisdom of that age old proverb which says When you cannot do as the Romans do when in Rome, make the Romans do what you want to do, and sneakily pulled down all the signboards in the middle of the night and changed the names of many places to suit their own stiff inanimate tongues.

But on the positive side, the Brits did find a way to enjoy the searing hot Indian curry and pickles with a fire extinguisher at hand and an ambulance parked outside. They also wisely replaced toilet paper in their loos with a water hose like the locals, just to be on the safer side.

So the main question here is how long before someone gets a brainwave about renaming the capital city of India, Delhi as Dilli, the Hindi pronounciation of the name? Not very long, I suppose. With a increasingly beseiged, failing, and incompetent leftwing UPA Government at the center, it won't be long before the tinkering heads at the UPA might try its hand at a little bit of chauvinism. Perhaps at a date closer to the General Elections scheduled to be held now a couple of years away in 2009 in an attempt to improve its dwindling chances at the polls. They are currently busy with trying to tinker with all the laws, norms, and the constitution and coming up against the stonewall of a disapproving supreme court and an increasingly irate Indian people.

Article Author: APOLLO

I live in Bangalore, the IT capital of India among some of the worst traffic offenders in the world. When i’am not caught in the middle of a traffic jam or writing some code for my company or trekking or partying, u can find me goofing off on the …

Visit APOLLO's author page — APOLLO's Blog