From India to Bharat?

Nationalists can fairly claim India has colonial connotations, but Bharat has been used to signify Hinduism

New Delhi has raised eyebrows at home and abroad after deciding to use the name Bharat instead of India on official invitations to world leaders for the G20 summit and at least one more upcom­ing international event. The name India has roots in Latin, Greek and Farsi, the name Bharat is rooted in ancient Hindu religious texts — which were written in Sanskrit — and is one of the country’s two official names. However, the name is almost unknown outside the country, and even in India, it is mostly only used by North Indians and Hindutva zealots because of its exclusionary nature — historical Bharat or Bharatavarsha did not include anything south of the Deccan.

While Indian nationalists can fairly claim that India has colonial connotations due to its foreign origin, Bharat has increasingly been used to signify not just Hinduism, but a specific, north Indian breed, which corresponds with the areas where the ruling BJP is the strongest. Some analysts also believe the renaming is a more blatant dig at the new Congress-led opposition grouping for next year’s elections — the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance, or INDIA — because the BJP fears the potential for voters literally and figuratively choosing India over the Bharatiya Janata Party. RSS leaders had also made a renewed push to encourage the use of Bharat. There are rumors that the government may bring the renaming to an official vote in a special session of parliament, which was scheduled a few days ago for later this month with­out an agenda being made public.

While several countries have changed their names, it has usually been to replace a ‘foreign’ name with a commonly used local one, or one which reflects the local pronunciation — Turkey becoming Turkyie, and the Czech Republic pushing for wider use of Czechia come to mind. Abandoning an inclusive name in favour of one that may alienate a large portion of the country does not come across as a good reason, no matter how many votes it generates.