Subject: Re: Bombay --> Mumbai
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 2002 15:11:17 +0000


Dear Swenja:

The issue of Bombay/Mumbai is indeed controversial, and precisely for the 
reasons you have identified. There are at least two theories about the 
origin of the name.

The first comes from the pro-changers -- the politicians and others, 
including Marathi-language chauvinists/activists -- who sought to have the 
name changed. They succeeded at this in the period of 1992 and 1996. In 1992 
the Bombay Municipal Corporation, I believe, decided to make the name 
change, and in 1996, if I recall correctly, the central government in New 
Delhi accepted the change. The logic for changing the name was that Bombay 
is a British/western corruption of Mumbai, the original name of the city. 
Mumbai, it was claimed, comes from the Goddess Mumbadevi, the reigning deity 
of the city. Mumbai, I remember being taught at my high school in Bombay, 
also came from a corruption of Maha Amba Ai, (Great Mother Goddess could be 
one way to translate it). Bombay, they argued, was a British imposition, and 
in postcolonial India it was necessary to make a break with that past. 
Marathi- and Gujarati-speakers in any case called the city in their own 
languages as Mumbai, and not Bombay. Marathi-speakers today form the 
second-largest group in the city; Gujarati-speakers are the third largest. 
The largest is Hindi, and Hindi-speakers had historically called the city 
Bambai, corruption of the term Bombay.

But as Dom Moraes showed in his book, Bombay, (and as Gillian Tindall also 
argues in her history of the city, Bombay: The City of Gold), Bombay comes 
from Bom Bahia, which is Portuguese for a good bay. And yes, Bombay has a 
good bay, and went on to become the country's main port (now second-most 
important, after the Nehru Port across the harbor). The Portuguese came to 
Bombay in the late 1490s and early 1500s, and in the city, which was then 
seven islands, they met fisherfolk from the koli community, who spoke 
Konkani, not Marathi. I am not aware what name they gave to the city 
collectively, if they did give it a name. The seven islands did have names, 
including Bassein, Colaba, and so on (I can dig them up if you are 
interested). The British gained the islands from the Portuguese as a dowry 
when Catherine of Braganza married an English prince, and later, they 
reclaimed land from the sea, making Bombay a unified whole island. Clearly, 
the Marathi-speakers, Gujarati-speakers, and Hindi-speakers moved to the 
city during this period. The Hindus among them may indeed have built a 
temple dedicated to a Goddess they named Mumbadevi, and may have started 
calling the city Mumbai. But it appears to me that Bombay preceded Mumbai.

Bombay, as Salman Rushdie, Vikram Chandra, and Rohinton Mistry have often 
argued through their fiction (and Rushdie, through his essays as well) 
became then a metaphor, of a unified, cosmopolitan, multieverything city. 
The call to make Bombay into Mumbai was seen as nativist, parochial, and 
ethnically-charged. We must remember that the leaders who wanted the change 
came from the Shiv Sena party, a semi-Fascist organization which has little 
time for democratic or peaceful niceties. In the 1960s they carried a 
movement against "Madrasis" or South Indians, who were taking away jobs; in 
early 1970s they targeted Gujaratis for being profit-seeking outsiders; and 
by mid-1980s they discovered Hindu nationalism. As part of their agenda, 
they began opposing anything they could call western and foreign. They 
oppose Valentine's Day celebrations; they've opposed films that show nudity; 
they are against cricket matches being played with Pakistan; they have 
criticized Muslim actors and others who are secular-minded and 
left-oriented; they have opposed McDonald's; and they led the movement 
against a US power project (Enron and Bechtel were involved) in Maharashtra. 
They are, in other words, representative of a particular brand of 
Hindu/Indian nativist, nationalistic, communal thinking (which has just 
emerged victorious in neighboring Gujarat). While they profess such 
policies, Shiv Sena's leaders run businesses with Muslim businessmen in 
Bombay, and they hosted a Michael Jackson concert with great pride, saying 
this shows India is now on the international map. I don't know whether to 
laugh or cry.....

Anyway, to make some sense of a post that's already gotten long: many Indins 
who oppose westernization would probably have accepted the name change more 
easily, had it not been championed by the Shiv Sena. Their move would still 
have been wrong, because Bombay was never a corruption of Mumbai; it was a 
different, earlier name, given to the islands that have always accepted 
outsiders and made them their own; and combined them into the mishmash of 
bhel puri and pao bhaji, which is the essence of Bombay. Yes, I prefer to, 
and continue to call it Bombay. (I do refer to it as Mumbai/Bambai, when I 
speak in Marathi/Gujarati or Hindi, just as I'd refer to Geneva as Geneve if 
I spoke in French, and Rome as Roma, if I spoke Italian....)

Hope this helps -- I have done some writing on these issues over the last 
few years; if you are interested let me know, and I can send it to you 
back-channel...

Best

Salil


>From: Swenja Thomsen <swenjathomsen-AT-gmx.de>
>Reply-To: postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>To: postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>Subject: Bombay --> Mumbai
>Date: Tue, 17 Dec 2002 14:52:09 +0100
>
>hi all!
>
>i have a few rather specific questions concerning "postcolonial"
>bombay/mumbai, following a vague hope that i may find an expert on
>indian local politics among the joiners of this list...
>
>i am currently preparing a bombay-mumbai-chapter for a study on the
>representation of aspects of so-called cultural globalization and other
>concepts of po-co theory in rushdie's work ( to explain this very
>vaguely where my english leaves me...) and would be very grateful for
>information on the following topics:
>
>- when exactly was bombay renamed mumbai and who (which parties or
>prominent figures)  was it who supported that issue
>in public? are both names still in use with the people or is it some
>sort of a political
>statement which one to use? how do locals feel about it? (it struck me
>that mr. r always
>seems to stick to Bombay in his novels and whenever he uses Mumbai it
>has a
>somewhat nationalist, hindu-fundamentalist touch to it.)
>and the other thing is
>- when (roughly) did the Shiv Sena appear on the political stage in
>Bombay and do
>they still have lots of followers today?
>
>this may not seem too specific after all, but i have found it difficult
>to find reliable indian sources here in hamburg and was interested in
>the opinion of a local.
>if anyone else can offer a hint/link on where to look this will be much
>appreciated!!
>
>thanks a lot
>
>swenja
>
>hamburg, germany
>
>
>
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