The name ‘Bharat’ may start appearing on official documents pertaining to schemes and government programmes, national and international invitations, and related papers, but without any retrospective effect, a senior central government official told News18.
‘Bharat’ has been in use on official documents already as part of schemes and programmes like ‘Karmayogi Bharat’.
“However, it became prominent when Home Minister Amit Shah proposed the names for our new penal codes. The Indian Penal Code becomes Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita and the same goes for the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) which becomes Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, while the Indian Evidence Act becomes Bharatiya Sakshya Bill,” added the official.
The word ‘Bharat’ will now dominate central government programmes like the ‘Bharat Drone Shakti’ in contrast to schemes named along the lines of ‘Make in India’ and ‘Start Up India’.
The official added that there is no legal implication of using ‘Bharat’ on official documents as both ‘India’ and ‘Bharat’ are constitutionally and legally valid names of the country. “Passports have ‘Republic of India’ on them and ‘Bharat Sarkar’ is also mentioned there. There is no question of violating any legal or constitutional sanctity. And there is no discussion over changing things in a retrospective way,” he said.
The mention of ‘Bharat’ on invitation cards for separate events sent out by the President’s and the Prime Minister’s Office have triggered a controversy, with the Opposition accusing the Narendra Modi government of resorting to “renaming” the country to score political points over its anti-BJP INDIA bloc ahead of Lok Sabha elections.
However, senior bureaucrats in the government said this particular issue has no connection with the name of the Opposition alliance. The transformation from ‘India’ to ‘Bharat’, which the government considers as a more Indic name, started long back, officials said.
Speaking to News18, Sanjeev Sanyal, member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister of India and a historian, said both names of the country are valid and there is no doubt about it. However, ‘Bharat’ originated from this land and is more Indic, he claimed.
“Bharat is an indigenous name, while India is a result of an ancient mispronunciation by foreigners,” said Sanyal.
Undoing Foreign Influence?
Bringing historical perspective to the usage of ‘Bharat’, Sanyal said: “’Bharat’ is an ancient name derived from a Rig Vedic tribe. There is another tradition coming from the Puranas and Jain tradition, which say that there was a Raja Bharat. Either way, these traditions are thousands of years old. The older Vedic tradition relates to a tribe called the Bharatas who created the first empire in India. The later tradition, both in Jain and Puranic traditions, speaks about a Raja Bharat who was the son or grandson of Raja Rishabh. So, the Vedic tradition is around 5,000-year-old while the Puranic traditions are over 2,500-year-old. Both of these traditions used the name ‘Bharat’ but the later tradition uses it for the full sub-continent.”
He further added that all the Puranas state something along the lines: “The land that is south of the Himalayas but north of the Ocean is the land where the Bharatas live.”
“In addition to this, the land is also called Sapta Sindhu, the Land of Seven Rivers, after the original homeland of Vedic Bharatas. The ancient Persians had a phonetic shift from S to H, so Sapta Sindhu became Hapta Hindu. So they started calling the people who live here as Hindus. This is also a 2,500-year-old tradition. The Greeks and others then made Hindu into India. So the name India is derived from Sapta Sindhu, and it is also an ancient name,” he said.
Administrative Implications
The government has been doing this in a steady and systematic way, so there will not be any administrative chaos, said another senior officer serving in the Ministry of Home Affairs. “There is a lot of speculation going on about the name change or change in documents, but there is no decision or discussion of seeing a retrospective effect to this. No document of any citizen would be recalled and there would not be any change in existing official document,” said the officer.
Talking to News18, KM Chandrasekhar, former cabinet secretary, said that there should not be any administrative issue unless the government wants to speed up things right away. “There is no legal or constitutional implication to it. Moreover, the use of ‘Bharat’ in certain documents is not new. It has now become prominent with the mention of this on the invitation card sent out by the President’s office and also by the proposed names for the IPC and CrPc,” he said.
“For larger changes, like change in the name of civil service from Indian Administrative Service to Bharatiya Administrative Service, the government needs to tweak the All India Service rule. For change in the name of any institution, they need bring an ordinance depending on the structure of the organisation or the institution. But this is all speculation for now,” he added.