West Bengal set to get new name

The West Bengal Cabinet on Wednesday passed a resolution to change the name of the state. The new name will be decided after consulting all political parties,intellectuals and cross-sections of society.

Chief Secretary Samar Ghosh has been asked to take necessary steps to implement the decision,Minister for Commerce and Industries Partha Chatterjee said after a meeting of the Cabinet presided by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. With the name of West Bengal,we face grave administrative problems. For example,in meetings of representatives from various states,our turn comes at the end since the name starts with the letter W. In fact,people doze off when we rise to speak. Our CM does not want this situation to go on, Chatterjee said.

He said the government would elicit the opinion of all recognised political parties as well as intellectuals.

In fact,this decision of the Trinamool Congress government completes a cycle that dates to 1999 when Jyoti Basu was chief minister.

That year,following an initiative taken by then deputy chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee,an all-party resolution was passed in the Assembly suggesting that the names of Calcutta be changed to Kolkata and West Bengal to Bangla.

On January 1,2001,Calcutta became Kolkata but the name of West Bengal could not be changed.