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General : Lessons from the attack on Mumbai?
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 Message 69 of 70 in Discussion 
From: MSN NicknameClearestWilhelm  in response to Message 68Sent: 12/1/2008 4:36 PM
It's all in the name Mumbai
1.Dec.08
After the tragic attacks on Bombay, it might seem trivial to complain that most of the foreign media call the city Mumbai. That is, after all, its official name. But though we may think we're being right-on by dropping the old Portugese title, many Indians would disagree. As Bombay's best contemporary chronicler, the Gujurati writer Suketu Mehta, points out, the Hindu-supremacist Maharashtra state government changed the name as part of its campaign to make Bombay a Hindu, or more specifically, Maharashtran city: a complete denial of its true identity as India's most multicultural (and also most Westernised) place. That sort of sectarianism, from the Muslim side, almost certainly underlies last week's horror. So names are important; and I, for one, will be sticking with Mehta, with my Indian friends, and with Bombay.