TMC renews demand to rename West Bengal as 'Bangla'
What's the story
The Trinamool Congress (TMC) has once again revived its demand to rename West Bengal to "Bangla."
The matter was raised by TMC MP Ritabrata Banerjee in the Rajya Sabha during Zero Hour.
Banerjee reminded the House that a resolution for the same had been passed by the West Bengal Assembly in July 2018 but is still pending approval from the central government.
Communication details
CM Banerjee's correspondence with PM Modi on renaming
He said that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had also written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi about the proposed name change.
In the letter, she wrote, "Re-christening will be in consonance with the history, culture, and identity of our state and will reflect the aspirations of our people."
"The present name 'West Bengal' is in English and 'Paschim Banga' in Bengali and does not bear the testimony of the classical history that our state has," she added.
Historical background
Historical context behind the proposed renaming
The demand for the name change stems from the fact that Bengal was divided during the 1947 partition into West Bengal and East Pakistan.
In 1971, East Pakistan became Bangladesh, leaving no geographical entity named East Pakistan.
"Today, there is no East Pakistan," Banerjee said in Rajya Sabha. "Our state's name needs to be changed. The mandate of the people of West Bengal needs to be honored."
Additional debates
Other parliamentary discussions alongside the renaming issue
The last time a state's name changed was in 2011, when Orissa became Odisha.
Before that, Bombay was renamed Mumbai in 1995, Madras to Chennai in 1996, Calcutta to Kolkata in 2001, and Bangalore to Bengaluru in 2014.
In other discussions, BJD's Debashish Samantaray demanded national festival status for "Bali Jatra."
TMC's Saket Gokhale pushed for cheaper ethanol benefits in petrol to reach consumers, while Sushmita Dev demanded dredging Assam's Barak River to ease goods movement.