Renaming Spree: Full Politics, Little History

NE of the earliest shock-and-awe campaigns of the Modi government was a renaming blitz.

- PRATIK KANJILAL

Its high point was the renaming of Delhi's Aurangzeb Road to commemorate former president APJ Abdul Kalam, replacing a 'bad Muslim' with a 'good Muslim' on the capital's roadmap.

The latest renaming project was much quieter—Fort William in Kolkata, the second fortification of the East India Company after Fort St George in Chennai, is now Vijaydurg. It's part of the process of decolonising the Indian military forces. Maybe it's low-key because it's a fine example of how decolonisation can go wrong if it's all politics and no history.

Vijaydurg on the Arabian Sea was the site of rebel Maratha maritime commander Tulaji Angre's defeat in 1756 by the combined forces of the East India Company and the Maratha Confederacy under the Peshwa. Not much opportunity to decolonise here. Let's turn to Fort William, the new Vijaydurg.

Kolkata and large parts of Bengal lived in terror of the Marathas for a decade from 1741. Particularly feared were the borgis—mercenary horsemen who conducted lightning raids for plunder rather than tactical gain. The Company authorities in Fort William built the Maratha Ditch for protection against raiders, and it is still a visible feature in Kolkata as an arterial road later built on the embankment.

Borgi is a uniquely Bangla word that persists in a lullaby in which a peasant asks how he will pay his taxes, because birds have eaten his grain and the borgis will take everything else. You would have to be history-blind to rename a fort in Bengal after a Maratha stronghold.