Both in the movie, "Slumdog Millionaire", and in class it was mentioned that the city of Bombay was renamed to Mumbai so I was intrigued to find out when and why the name was changed. Come to find out, it was changed back in 1995 after Shiv Shena, the Hindu Nationionalist party, won the election in Maharashtra and enacted the change, which they had tried pushing for many years prior. The reason Shiv Shena gave for the change was that "Bombay" was a corrupted English version of "Mumbai." The name "Mumbai" comes from the patron deity, Hindu godess Mumbadevi. Similar to how many European and American cities are named after patron saitns (Ex. San Francisco). All local businesses, federal agencies, newspapers, etc. were also forced to make this change but some feared if the name was changed to Mumbai, that they would not receive the same ammount of international attention when they were Bombay. The name "Bollywood" was also attempted to be changed, but has stuck around to this day. Other Indian cities have changed their names since 1996 from their former British or Portuguese names to ones that resemble their homeland better. The article can be found in the link below.
http://www.slate.com/id/2205701/
No comments:
Post a Comment