The Name Game

Wanting to change the name of a State because it comes low down in the alphabetical order has to be reasoning of the most bizarre, not to say, insensitive kind. You almost expect a Committee to be set up to correlate ‘Quantum of Central Government Grants with Alphabetical Position of States’; final report to be presented in the Winter session of the Assembly, accompanied by full scale walkouts, dislocation of furniture, etc.

I mean, Tamilnadu is just 3 steps up the ladder, and doing quite well, thank you. And not just for alphabetical reasons.

No wonder politicians aren’t exactly the flavour of the season, you tell yourself. But West Bengal (ooops!) is luxuriating in the sweet rain of change and perhaps something surprisingly creative will come out of all this, you console yourself.

And then, in the papers, one cloudy morning not so long ago…Paschim Banga. Paschim of what? Bangladesh. But why should we locate ourselves with relation to another country? Because a historical marker is important. Says who? The 12 or 13 Wise Ones of the All Party Committee of Legislators. They were all quite convinced about this, were they? Well, not really. Some thought this, and some thought that and some, as usual, thought nothing but they took a ‘unanimous’ decision…and they did it- reportedly- in 10 minutes. How’s that for quick decision making?

Consider this. Non- Bengalis (whom a Bengali friend wickedly terms ‘not-Bengali’) have a tough time with ‘Kolkata’ and it saddens you no end to hear the name of your very own city being distorted in the most peculiar ways. What, oh, what will they do with Paschim/ Pashchim Banga/ Bango/ Bongo (except a lot of byango, that is?) Did the Wise Ones think of this? They had no problems at all pronouncing it, but it is true that they were all Bengalis. But aren’t we a multilingual, multicultural State and don’t we take pride in our inclusiveness? That’s all very well, but it was a unanimous decision taken by 13 people, never mind that they didn’t all think alike and never mind how the dictionary defines ‘unanimous’. And, remember, the decision took just 10 minutes.

So why waste ‘West Bengal’ when Paschim Banga is so much of a muchness? Not to mention that it’s unnecessarily nostalgic and a linguistical nightmare for most other Indians? Here’s the reason. ‘We cannot have an English name for our State. We must shake off the colonial yoke’.

But haven’t we demonstrated once and for all (with distinguished Bengali writers doing a lot of the demonstrating) that English is by now an ‘Indian’ language? Remember a man called Tagore and the Prize that he got called the Nobel? In more recent times, remember the prose of Amartya Sen and Amitav Ghosh? And in any case, if the yoke had to be shaken (and not stirred), did we have to make such a scrambled egg out of it? Could we not have waited, invited opinions, encouraged discussion, weighed countless aspects of what is surely a crucial decision in the cultural life, in the very identity of a State? Ten minutes is all it takes these days, we are given to understand.

What culture, what identity, you might ask. Here’s the answer, you are told. It is a political decision. Your elected representatives have taken it according to their party diktats. And as we all know, parties are more important than people. Now go and live with it for the rest of your life.

No, wait. If the ‘Quantum of Central Government Grants to Alphabetical Position’ graph doesn’t climb, we might consider another nudge up the alphabetical ladder next year.