William Shakespeare, in his renowned play \u201cRomeo and Juliet,\u201d once famously uttered the words, \u201cWhat\u2019s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet,\u201d to emphasize the insignificance of names. However, in reality, naming conventions carry substantial importance. The rumour that the government is considering changing our country\u2019s name from \u201cIndia\u201d to \u201cBharat\u201d has ignited an unprecedented row. This controversy arose after our honourable president referred to herself as the \u201cPresident of Bharat\u201d in a dinner invitation to foreign delegates at the ongoing G20 summit. The opposition block has grown increasingly critical of this rumour as they coined their alliance name with an abbreviation \u201cI.N.D.I.A.\u201d. Sashi Tharoor, the prominent congress leader, has even proposed a change in their alliance name from \u201cI.N.D.I.A.\u201d to \u201cB.H.A.R.A.T.\u201d Providing more context to the development, the United Nations spokesperson has also commented that they entertain requests for country name changes when they are received.
On the other hand, the Supreme Court made it explicitly clear in 2016 that it is an individual\u2019s prerogative to choose between \u201cBharat\u201d and \u201cIndia\u201d based on personal preference. In this context, our honourable President\u2019s choice is entirely personal and does not necessarily reflect the government\u2019s intention. As a citizen, I also prefer to use \u201cBharat\u201d over \u201cIndia.\u201d When we utter the word \u201cBharat,\u201d we naturally feel a connection to the common cultural heritage shared by millions of people on this subcontinent for thousands of years and it is an obvious source of pride. In contrast, the term \u201cIndia\u201d can evoke a sense of a dismaying geopolitical boundary forcibly imposed by the Britishers upon us as a legacy of colonial dominance. It\u2019s worth noting that many Bharatiya nationalists considered the word \u201cIndia\u201d derogatory during our freedom struggle. Classical Indian literature of the pre-colonial era never utilized the term \u201cIndia.\u201d \u201cBharat\u201d has been the name of our land since the time immemorial. Interestingly, the Sanskrit meaning of \u201cBharat\u201d is the \u201cContinuous saga for wisdom,\u201d which rightfully reflects the essence of our culture and tradition. Therefore, the unnecessary controversy surrounding this issue should be put to rest.
Ranjan Das, Assistant Professor
Patkai Christian College
(Autonomous)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
William Shakespeare, in his renowned play \u201cRomeo and Juliet,\u201d once famously uttered the words, \u201cWhat\u2019s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell just as sweet,\u201d to emphasize the insignificance of names. However, in reality, naming conventions carry substantial importance. The rumour that the government is considering changing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-377010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=377010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377010\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=377010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=377010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=377010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}