West Bengal now becomes Paschim Banga

Kolkata - 19 August 2011 (IANS): The West Bengal government, along with the opposition parties of the state, Friday unanimously decided to rename West Bengal as Paschim Banga, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said.

"It has been unanimously decided by the state government and all the political parties of the state that the name of the state be renamed from West Bengal to Paschim Banga."In Bengali we call our state Paschim Banga but in English we say West Bengal. But from now on in English also, our state will be called and will be written as Paschim Banga," said Banerjee while addressing a programme here.An all-party meeting was held in the state assembly Friday to discuss the renaming of the state."The new name will now be passed in the state assembly then it will be sent to the union ministry of home affairs. From there, it will go to the parliament and then to the president for assent," Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) leader Manoj Bhattacharjee who was present in the meeting, told IANS."We felt that due to historical and administrative reasons, all of us wanted to rename the state. After lot of discussion we found that it is better to have a name which is closer to the alphabet 'A'. We may not be very closer to 'A' but we have upgraded ourselves from 'W' to 'P' which is much closer to 'A'," Industries Minister Partha Chatterjee said at a media conference here.