Is India Changing Its Name to Bharat? G20 Invite Controversy Explained

Channel News Asia ^ | 07 Sep 2023

[nickcarraway]

NEW DELHI: Invites sent by Indian President Droupadi Murmu calling herself "President of Bharat" for a dinner on the sidelines of the G20 summit have stirred speculation that the government may be about to change the country's name.

WHAT IS THE CONTROVERSY ABOUT INDIA'S NAME?

By convention, invitations issued by Indian constitutional bodies have always mentioned the name India when the text is in English, and the name Bharat when the text is in Hindi.

However, the invites - in English - for the G20 dinner called Murmu the President of Bharat. An official at the president's office said they didn't want to comment on the issue when asked by Reuters.

[reg45]

Does that mean that the Cleveland Indians can take their name back?

[Right_Wing_Madman]

It was called “HINDUSTAN” and “HIND” before the British arrived.

India has been known as India for the last 2,500 years. The Latin name for India is India.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

A brutal thought just entered my mind. If they change the name will the American Indians now be called American Brats?

[Jyotishi]

Yes, the names just roll off the tongue!

[Jyotishi]

List of languages by number of native speakers

Ordered by number of speakers as first language.

More than one million speakers

The 2011 census recorded 31 individual languages as having more than 1 million native speakers (0.1% of total population). The languages in bold are scheduled languages (the only scheduled language with less than 1 million native speakers is Sanskrit). The first table is restricted to only speaking populations for scheduled languages.

First language speakers

Second language
speakers[12]
Third language
speakers[12]
Total speakers

Language
Figure[12]
% of total
population

Figure[13][12]
% of total
population

Hindi [note 2]
528,347,193
43.63%
139,207,180
24,160,696
691,347,193
57.09%

Bengali
97,237,669
8.03%
9,037,222
1,008,088
107,237,669
8.85%

Telugu
81,127,740
6.70%
11,946,414
1,001,498
94,127,740
7.77%

Marathi
83,026,680
6.86%
12,923,626
2,966,019
99,026,680
8.18%

Tamil
69,026,881
5.70%
6,992,253
956,335
77,026,881
6.36%

Gujarati
55,492,554
4.58%
4,035,489
1,007,912
60,492,554
4.99%

Urdu [note 3]
50,772,631
4.19%
11,055,287
1,096,428
62,772,631
5.18%

Kannada
43,706,512
3.61%
14,076,355
993,989
58,706,512
4.84%

Odia
37,521,324
3.10%
4,972,151
31,525
42,551,324
3.51%

Malayalam
34,838,819
2.88%
499,188
195,885
35,538,819
2.93%
Punjabi
33,124,726
2.74%
2,300,000
720,000
36,074,726
2.97%

Assamese
15,311,351
1.26%
7,488,153
740,402
23,539,906
1.94%

English
259,678
0.02%
83,125,221
45,993,066
129,259,678
10.67%

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_number_of_native_speakers_in_India

[beethovenfan]

Sounds like a Hindu fart.

[SeekAndFind]

If enough Indians want a change, I don’t see why not.

Sri Lanka used to be Ceylon, Zimbabwe used to be Rhodesia and Myanmar used to be Burma.

Heck, Indian cities have changed their names too. Mumbai used to be Bombay and Chennai used to be Madras. Kolkata was Calcutta, etc.

[drop 50 and fire for effect]

The irony is that if the British had not built the Raj, India would not be a country, but a subcontinent of many countries. They stitched it together and it ultimately only split into 3 parts as opposed to dozens.

[dfwgator]

Or the Stanford Indians?

[MIchaelTArchangel]

Why should I give a Hindi or a Shi’ite about what other want to call their country?

[x]

They've been using the two names for a long time. It's up there in the corner.

There may be a conflict between two kinds of national pride. One is wanting to go with the Hindi name and make the rest of the world use it and drop the foreign name. But "India" is known all around the world. "Bharat" doesn't have the same resonance. Burma could become Myanmar, because not that many people were familiar with the country. If India changes its name something would be lost.

[chajin]

Kannada 43,706,512

There are more people in Kannada than in Canada.

Wonder how many bar rats there are in Bharat.

One thing we can say about the President of Bharat is that Murmu will never wear a mumu; most of the time she will be a sari sight.

[Clemenza]

India is a poophole country. Why couldn’t the Brits had done to Hinduism what the Spanish and French Catholics did to the pagan faiths of the Amerindians.

[chajin]

Burma could become Myanmar, because not that many people were familiar with the country.

I would disagree: not only was Burma one of the main battlefields in the Pacific War, but every road had a Burma Shave sign as late as the 1960s.

[Jyotishi]

You like to play with words and you’re not changing, chajin.

[IndianChief]

If enough Indians want a change, I don’t see why not.

There IS no change. Article 1 of the Indian constitution says, "India, that is Bharat..." and the official Hindi versions starts with-translated- "Bharat, that is India...."

All the Govt is doing is giving primacy to the Sanskrit word over the English (Latin?) word.

The word "India" cannot be banned without changing the constitution. However, govt communications can change the primacy of one of the names.

[SeekAndFind]

RE: All the Govt is doing is giving primacy to the Sanskrit word

If that is the case, then what will be the official name used in daily international transactions from now on?

Will the United Nations use the Sanskrit name? Will the Olympic Games, International meetings, newspaper references, etc. use the Sanskrit name?

[IndianChief]

Internationally, India will be used. Internally Bharat will gain primacy.

the ruling Conservative and Nationalist party has Bharat in its name. The elitist corrupt opposition party uses "Indian" in it's name.Just saying..

[SunkenCiv]

• Why India's government wants to change the country's name to 'Bharat' [09/06/2023]

[RitchieAprile]

That charted when I was a kiddo..