Election in-sight: The name game in North Delhi Municipal Corporation

NEW DELHI: With elections approaching, the North Delhi Municipal Corporation may not have the money for sops, but what it has in plenty are names to dole out. From community icons such as Maharaja Agrasen and Chhotu Ram to sundry gods and goddesses, the civic body in its house meet lined up names for almost 90 roads and parks, obviously in the hope that the naming spree will prove remunerative in terms of ballots.
However, in order not to paint the exercise in such blatant terms, Tara Chand Bansal, deputy mayor and vice-head of the Naming/Renaming Committee, said that the naming exercise would not benefit the councillors because “the public knows better”.He did, however, admit that the chosen names represented the political and social contours of particular localities.
Requests for renaming of roads and parks are routed through the area councillor and the municipal secretary’s office to the naming panel. The political importance of the committee can be gauged from the fact that it is headed by the mayor himself and includes all the major functionaries such as deputy mayor, leader of the House, standing committee chairman, leader of the opposition and senior councillors.
It was such a committee that okayed 67 names on January 9 to add to the 22 that got the go ahead on December 8 last year and sent it to the House for its endorsement. In normal times, the House approves 10-20 names. The exponential rise this time then has to be interpreted in the backdrop of the approaching election season.
Bansal’s ward of Rohini East alone will see five locations named strategically after Baba Banda Bahadur, Hanuman, Krishna, Maharaja Agrasen and Rani Lakshmi Bai. “This has nothing to do with elections,” Bansal reiterated. “A councillor who has not worked hard in his term of five years will never be able to sway the public with naming exercises.” But a look at the names chosen betrays the effort to woo certain communities and sections.
With the trader (baniya) community miffed with the demonetisation setbacks, Agrasen, an icon for traders, has a new presence in Rohini East, Rohini Central, Naharpur, Adarsh Nagar and Rajendra Nagar. Not far behind is Chhotu Ram, a champion of the Jats, with parks and roads now bearing his name in Rithala, Burari, Nangloi and Rohini. Among the other names, 26 are of a divine nature, Krishna easily being the favourite.
Baba Banda Bahadur appears thrice in the list with other Sikh gurus in places like Prashant Vihar, Rani Bagh and North Rohini. Dalits in Mangolpuri and Rithala will see BR Ambedkar, Kanshi Ram and Maharishi Valmiki on the signboards. And to be sure, personalities figuring prominently in right-wing iconography — from Swami Vivekananda to Bhagat Singh and Deen Dayal Upadhyaya — are multiple choices.