Prime Minister Modi Considers Changing India's Official Name to 'Bharat'

Sitting on Bharat Sign at G20 Opening Ceremony
Official Proposal Expected to Change 'India' Name

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi sat on a sign that read Bharat at the opening ceremony of the Group of Twenty (G20) summit on the 9th. This has led to speculation that the official name of India might be changed.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

The Financial Times (FT) and Bloomberg News speculated that Prime Minister Modi would officially propose a name change after the G20 summit. Some members of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), to which Modi belongs, have demanded that the country's name be changed to Bharat. Although the Indian Constitution states "India, that is Bharat," Bharat has so far only been used in Hindi conversations.

Meanwhile, the dispatch of an opening day dinner invitation addressed to the G20 delegation from President Bharat, Droupadi Murmu, has fueled predictions that the name change is imminent.

The BJP has convened a special parliamentary session starting on the 18th. Although the agenda has not yet been announced, the right-wing camp, including the Hindu nationalist BJP, argues that "the word India carries traces of colonialism" and insists that "the official country name should be changed to Bharat."

On the other hand, major opposition parties in India oppose the ruling party's insistence on the Hindi name Bharat, viewing it as an attempt to exclude minority groups and the Muslim population who do not speak Hindi.