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By Sugeeswara Senadhira/Ceylon Today
Colombo, September 12: “India that is Bharat is a Union of States,” the First Article of the Indian Constitution specifies. Hence, there is no constitutional contradiction in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s dinner invitation to G20 leaders calling himself the “Prime Minister of Bharat”. The issue could however become controversial if the strategy to change India to Bharat is an attempt to link it to Modi’s political party, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
The present name issue reminds me of the Indian National Congress President D.K. Barooah’s infamous statement in 1972 that “Indira is India, India is Indira”. Indira Gandhi was riding high at that time after the victory over Pakistan in the 1971 war in which East Pakistan became Bangladesh and Congress sycophants hailed Indira as the, “Empress of India”.
However, five years later the Congress was defeated at the polls and Indira Gandhi could not even retain her seat Amethi and the new MP for Amethi, Raj Narain of Janatah Party publicly mocked that “Indira is not even Amethi”.
New Delhi media reports say India could officially be renamed “Bharat” by the Narendra Modi Government.
They suggest Modi’s ruling Hindu nationalist Government is looking to change the country’s name during an upcoming “special session” of Parliament.
Modi, who placed a garland at Mahatma Gandhi’s portrait in his new office before assuming official duties in 2014, later concentrated on steadily chipping away at the legacies of former governments and leaders, changing names of official landmarks and buildings of national importance, while the Prime Minister says India has “left behind” former rulers Britain in a move to break away from the country’s colonial past. He erected a gigantic statue of the first Deputy Prime Minister Vallabhbhai Patel, to place him above Gandhis and Nehrus.
As expected Opposition parties criticised Modi’s plans to name India Bharat, but senior BJP figures have welcomed the name change.
The Indian Constitution empowers Parliament to change the name and boundaries of States under the Union, through a resolution passed by a simple majority. No constitutional amendment is required. This has happened many times since the Constitution came into force in 1950. As coincidence would have it, Madras was the first State to be bifurcated (to create a new one, Andhra Pradesh) in 1953 and renamed Tamil Nadu (1969).
Some Opposition Leaders alleged that the BJP Government also has plans to change the name of the capital from New Delhi to Indraprastha, as known in the Mahabharat, or by its original name Kandavaprastha, before the Pandavas entered the city.
India is the name given during the colonial period and BJP hardliners want to remove all vestiges of the colonial past. The speculation now is that the Government would move Parliament on the name change in the specially called session later this month. Prior to that, it may be necessary to seek the opinion of the Supreme Court on, not only the procedures and processes, but also the constitutionality of the name change.
There’s a growing push among BJP MPs to adopt the name change, since “India” – the conventional English rendering of the country’s name – to some at least, symbolises “colonial slavery”. There have been previous petitions seeking such a name change, but these were dismissed by the Supreme Court in 2016, and again in 2020.
Part of the rationale offered by supporters of the name change is that Bharat is an indigenous term that goes back in history and was prominent in the anti-colonial struggles – for example, the slogan “Bharat Mata ki Jai” (Hail to Mother Bharat). But there are other more important political ideological factors that must not be missed.
Prof. Nitasha Kaul, Director, Centre for the Study of Democracy (CSD) stated that the Hindutva, or political Hindu right-wing vision of India cherished by the RSS and BJP, is one where Bharat stands not just for a country that is India, but also connotes an idyll of pure Hindutva morality. “For citizens in need of life and livelihood security, a renamed Bharat is a hollow promise trading on manipulated narratives of past glory,” concluded Dr. Kaul who is also Professor of Politics, International Relations, and Critical Interdisciplinary Studies, University of Westminster.
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