Dwarka: Roads in Dwarka are being treated like that infant whom everyone calls by a different adorable name. Every other day, a board is installed at a crossroad or a central verge green area with a new name.
At sector 13/14 road, also known as Sambhav Chowk, a new board was installed recently, naming it ‘Om Chowk’. The new name is derived from the nearby Om Apartments at Sector 14. Similarly, sector 11/12 and sector Sector 4/5/11/12 crossroads are recently named KM and Ashirwad chowk respectively. The two crossroads are in close proximity to Ashirvad Apartments and KM Apartments.
At many places in Dwarka, boards with religious and patriotic names are also being installed. Now, many places have multiple names, confusing both commuters and residents.
SK Gupta a resident of Sector 11 says, “It is an offence to install boards on public land as per your whims and fancies. On the other hand, it is making the whole purpose of naming a place a farcical.”
As per the locals, in the recent past, many religious and spiritual institutions have come up in Dwarka and to spread awareness about their institutes they started renaming the areas. At many junctions, names related to martyrdom, freedom struggle or war are being used.
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Sunita Yadav a resident of Sector 10 says, “ I witnessed some new names to me such as the name of ‘Vikas Upadhyay’ as a martyr installed at the crossing of Sector 1/2/7/6. This is a new thing for me after seeing this busy chowk for years. One more board with ISKON Chowk came up overnight at Sector 12/13 which was earlier known as Vidyut Chowk. It was named after a society in Sector 12. Don’t know who did it and how. But if it is done according to rules and regulations then fine otherwise it would set a wrong precedent.”
The renaming of the roads is also being done for commercial purposes. Many educational institutes, schools, NGOs etc have installed their boards at different locations and have renamed them for branding. Many also install boards with police colours, emblems or some advisory message to make them look authentic.
Nirmal Singh a resident of Sector 5 says, “ Naming in such a way is just a mockery of the system. There is a certain rule under which a place is named, but anyone can name any place just by installing a board. You spend a few hundred and name a major place. Such a ridiculous trend it is in Dwarka. It must be stopped by the authorities.”
Many crossroads in Dwarka are officially recorded in the documents of the DDA, MCD and other authorities. though those names were kept randomly after the names of the particular societies nearest to those chowks. The practice is being carried out in a way that no one could judge whether those boards are officially installed or not. Such boards could be seen in the blue coloured background with white letters as such boards are used by the authorities
When we approached the DDA officials as these boards are on the land of DDA, we were informed that there are no such official names of roads in Dwarka, yet many are in use for quite some time so have become popular.