Bhopal: Giving credit

Among the few cities that I’ve seen, I liked one small thing about Bhopal in my short stay of a month here. If only miniscule, the difference is, nonetheless, noticeable, comment worthy and, from my point of view, admirable.

Buildings, public institutions, parks and traffic circles here bear names commemorating range of India's historical and political figures. Sarojini Naidu, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sister Nivedita, Swami Vivekanand, Swami Dayanand, Maharana Pratap, Tatya Tope, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Rani Laxmi Bai and Mahatma Gandhi are but an handful. I don’t know if this is common in other cities of India but I am impressed by variety in honouring our historical past. I am irked by tendency of certain party of ruling elite to repeatedly give credit to same persons while ignoring others. Perhaps the greatest tragedy Lal Bahadur Shastri suffered was to be born on the same day as Mahatma Gandhi, who, as is known well now, is a poster boy for Congress for everything. I think one thing that we can easily and cheaply do without really doing anything is to give credit, at least posthumously. Of course, one certain party in Maharashtra has the longest list of names in its honour roll.