Art of renaming: Rechristening of Calcutta’s streets started with British and continues today
Telegraph | 24 March 2025
Calcutta’s map has seen Clive make way for Netaji and Harrington for Ho Chi Minh, with successive governments leaving the imprint of national pride and ideology on the city’s streets and buildings.
The latest act of renaming, however, involves one of Calcutta’s — and its former colonial rulers’ — most emblematic structures.
Fort William has been designated Vijay Durg by the BJP-led central government in celebration of India’s greatest military victory — over Pakistan 54 years ago — in which the Eastern Command headquarters played a crucial role.
Most of the new names given to Calcutta’s streets and monuments down the decades have tended to pass without comment, at worst drawing a shrug of indifference. But like one of the BJP’s earlier ventures — the naming of Calcutta Port after Jana Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mookerji — this one too has generated some controversy.
Vijay Durg has a namesake in Maharashtra that has reminded many Calcuttans of the havoc wrought on Bengal by the Borgi pillagers of the mid-18th century, causing some indignation at the new name given to Fort William.
Historians said the rechristening of Calcutta’s streets and buildings was nothing new: the British started it and then the nationalists, communists and Trinamool Congress successively took up the mantle.
The East India Company would initially name the arterial roads of Calcutta based on a place name. But the Lottery Committee, set up in the early 19th century, named what is now Bidhan Sarani and Nirmal Chunder Street after British administrators.
The Lottery Committee’s day job was to raise funds through public lotteries for the city’s roads and drainage system.
“The Lottery Committee, possibly in a bid to placate the East India Company and ensure a longer life for the committee, named roads after British administrators,” said Debasis Bose, an urban historian who has researched Calcutta’s roads and their names.
“What is now Bidhan Sarani was Cornwallis Street, Nirmal Chunder Street was Wellington Street and Rafi Ahmed Kidwai Road was Wellesley Street.”
Bose added: “The arterial roads were not named after personalities. Central Avenue connected Calcutta’s north with its central district; Chitpore Road went straight to Chitpore and Circular Road was named so because of its shape.”
Mirzapur Street and Lalbazar Street too were named after localities.
When Indians entered the then Calcutta Corporation, Central Avenue was named after the first Indian mayor of Calcutta, Chittaranjan Das, years before Independence.
A Calcutta Corporation managed by Indians was made possible by the Calcutta Municipal Act, 1923, which ensured the Indianisation of the bigger local bodies such as the one in Calcutta. It also prioritised the presence of elected members over nominated ones. Das became mayor in 1924.
“Central Avenue was named after Chittaranjan Das around the 1930s,” said Tapati Guha Thakurta, honorary professor of history at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences.
Historian Sugata Bose said: “Clive Row in Burrabazar area was officially renamed Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose Road on August 15, 1947.”
The interior roads were named or renamed mostly after Indians — someone who had donated a portion of their land to build the road, or a famous personality who lived there and would make the area easily identifiable.
“There is a road in Rajabazar named Girish Bidyaratna Lane because he had donated land to build the lane. Baranasi Ghose’s Street (in Jorasanko) has the house of Ghose,” Debasis Bose said.
After Independence, perpetuating the memory of nationalist leaders became a priority for successive governments. Harrison Road became Mahatma Gandhi Road, Grey Street turned into Aurobindo Sarani.
In the years that followed, parks and edifices too were renamed. The Ochterlony Monument, named after Major General David Ochterlony, was renamed Shahid Minar in honour of the martyrs of the freedom movement.
College Square was renamed Vidyagar Udyan and Minto Square became Shahid Bhagat Singh Udyan.
The CPM-led Left Front renamed several roads after personalities who had little connection with Calcutta but served to make an ideological point. For instance, Dharmatolla Street turned into Lenin Sarani.
Sometimes a renaming sparkled with mischief. Harrington Street, which houses the US Consulate, became Ho Chi Minh Sarani around the time of the Vietnam War when the CPM controlled the civic body.
The Trinamool government’s love of renaming proved so inexhaustible that Calcutta seemed in apparent danger of running out of streets to indulge the passion. Why else would long roads begin to be cut in two, notionally, with each stretch named after a different person?
Sometimes, a road already named after an illustrious personality was renamed after another.
Lake Terrace in south Calcutta is one such example. “Our office at Jadunath Bhavan, the house where (historian) Jadunath Sarkar lived, is on Lake Terrace. It had already been renamed Jadunath Sarkar Sarani,” Guha Thakurta said.
“Then, about 10 years ago, street signage appeared carrying the name ‘Debabrata Biswas Sarani’, although Debabrata Biswas never lived there.” The signage was later removed.
Guha Thakurta cited further examples of such “senseless” renaming.
“Camac Street was renamed Abanindranath Tagore Sarani but Abanindranath never lived there, nor has any connection with the street,” she said.
To some Calcuttans, the name “Vijay Durg” is insensitive if not senseless.
The other Vijay Durg, an old fort along the Sindhudurg coast in Maharashtra, served as a naval base for the Marathas under Chhatrapati Shivaji.
While the army has said the renaming has no connection to the Maharashtra fort, it has reminded many Calcuttans of the horrors of the invasions of the Borgis (Maratha raiders).
Will the new name catch on in a city that likes to preserve the memory of at least some of its colonial history?
Often in the past, name changes involving even revered personalities have failed to capture the popular imagination. Calcuttans have immense respect for Mother Teresa but Park Street continues to be Park Street in popular parlance.