Gopal Krishna Gokhale road, anyone?

Ata he kaay navin? Some rather nationalist spirited coves are demanding that the city of Puna be no longer addressed by the aforementioned label slapped at it, by the pronounciation impaired British, but by its sanct original name "Pune". Its only fair. If Bombay is called Mumbai, Calcutta now becomes Kolkata and even Bangalore has no qualms of being addressed as an absurdly difficult name, Bengalooru, why should this name-correction spirit not enter into the hearts of us Punekars? So that is the way things are gonna be. And people blasphemous to this new rule are threatened with "dire consequences". And Dire, the consequences will be, given the profile of these name-correction protagonists, for they are our feared nationalist brigades. Yes, look out of your windows, and if you happen to see a car, mostly a Sumo or a Scorpio, buzz past at an absolutely manical speed, driven by such a maniac, with an overlarge saffron flag sprightly atop their bosoms, that is who they are. To sum it up, its an ugly car, driven by an ugly man, at an ugly speed, with ugly intentions, and furthermore, if you fail to pay heed to his command, he will make you look like him even if you look like Brad Pitt originally. Also he will use his rather poor knowledge of sciences and rearrange your bones the way he likes them. Well, that is neither here nor there. But the message is clear. One would not, under any given circumstance, want to cross their, or for that matter, their cars' paths.


So at the receiving end of their rather ill-tempers will be those establishments, who have successfully so established their enterprises, bearing the name "Poona". And thus the dire-consequence threat was hurled rather strongly in the dashed faces of the bakers and the hospital owners with such names. "You know how we drive our cars. If you don't change.. well.. we'll be driving them right through your damned establishments."


And no more "JM" road by the way. No acronyms that seemingly diminish the importance of Mr. Jangli Maharaj. No "FC" road either. Well, actually its not Ferguson Road at all. Thanks to a shocking discovery unveiled in one of the papers we subscribe to, we found the real names of some roads. It made quite a point of it recently of how the cultural atheists go about naming the city's roads and what not as if they were unke baap ke. Its actually Gopal Krishna Gokhale road, that ends in Gopal Krishna Gokhale Chowk, not Goodluck Chowk. Not G-K-G Chowk either. Should we not show a modicum of respect to our freedom fighters? What is this nonsense of "MG" road? Dost lagte hai kyaa tumhare?


Quite frankly, I'm very much opposed to naming our roads after freedom fighters in general and then referring to them in full form too. It would create a bit of embarrasment if an occasion were to arise, where one would have to say, "I'm going to so-and-so-bar on Mahatma Gandhi road" or maybe "get 2kg mutton from the butcher on Mahatma Gandhi Road". Imagine! Going to a road named after one who made a rather emphatic point against alcohol drinking for sport, to drink alcohol for sport! Leaves some scope for guilt and rethink doesn't it? I say either not call them that or stop having the bars there. Or maybe have a road, named after some disloyal, treacherous traitor and throw all our bars there! It'd feel much better to say, "I'm going to Chandni Bar on Lord Curzon road" :D


Well with that, I'm going to Apache lounge on Ferguson.. i mean er.. Gopal Krishna Gokhale Road. :-/