Haryana government renames Gurgaon as 'Gurugram'

GURGAON/CHANDIGARH: Gurgaon will now be called Gurugram. The corporate hub, home to some 250 Fortune 500 companies, is being renamed for its perceived epic roots, turning on its head the very concept of a Millennium City of the future.The name change was announced in Chandigarh on Tuesday by the Manohar Lal Khattar government, which said it was keeping its poll promise. A government spokesperson said Guru Dronacharya, the guru of the Pandavas in the Mahabharata, had his ashram here. Officials in the chief minister's office said the decision to rename Gurgaon was taken following representations from several forums.The renaming, which is likely to take the sheen off Brand Gurgaon that became a symbol of pride for Corporate India over the past two decades, came in for sharp criticism on social media, with many questioning the rationale behind the move.But a government spokesperson said, "Gurgaon was a great centre of learning, where the princes were educated. For long, the locals have been demanding that Gurgaon be renamed Gurugram."Changing Gurgaon's name to Gurugram, however, does not follow the earlier pattern of renaming cities. When Calcutta became Kolkata, or Bombay Mumbai, or Madras Chennai and Bangalore Bengaluru, all that happened was cities shed their anglicised names and went back to the prevalent vernacular version. Bengalis, speaking in their language, anyway called Calcutta Kolkata. The same applied to Tamils speaking in their mother tongue, calling Madras Chennai. Gurgaon, however, was a vernacular name, and the renaming by the BJP government in Haryana seems an attempt to shine the light on a mythical past.