A group of Indian nationalists are engaged in a heated exchange with Royal Bombay Yacht Club about its insistence on flying the Union flag, 50 years after independence. "We requested the club to change the flag and were told that the matter would be discussed at a meeting," said a member of the India Awake Association, which is leading the campaign.
"But since they have not, it is quite obvious the club is proud of its British flag," he said.
To most Indians this would be seen as a shameful reminder of colonial rule. The exclusive 131-year-old club, located opposite the Gateway of India, the spot where British East India Company merchants first landed nearly 250 years ago, did not admit Indian members for almost 15 years after independence. Even then, their activities were restricted to sailing in the Arabian Sea.
Colonial history has been dealt a severe blow, however, by changing the names of several cities.
The southern port city of Madras is now known as Chennai - as part of a movement to remove all traces of a colonial past and satisfy growing religious and chauvinistic aspirations.
Mr M. Karunanidhi, chief minister of Tamil Nadu state, said renaming Madras was "righting" the record and wiping away traces of colonial history. Madras was one of the first ports developed by the British East India Company in 1639 and got its name from Madraspatam, a small village a few miles inland.
The Hindu fundamentalist coalition government in the western state of Maharashtra has also changed the name of Bombay, the state capital, to Mumbai, after the goddess whose temple still exists in the city.
New Delhi's local Hindu fundamentalist BJP government established a State Naming Authority to rename existing streets and squares after relatively unknown Hindu personalities. "This will ensure that coming generations take inspiration from them," said a BJP leader. Historians, however, say the impunity with which state governments tamper with symbols of the past confirms the oft repeated adage that India has "only geography but no history".
