Is it Albert Victor Road or Alur Venkat Rao Road? Whatever the name, there now is a proposal to rename this road as Tipu Sultan Palace Road.
The main road in Chamarajpet is in the midst of a renaming storm. While the BJP-Karnataka unit has opposed the proposal to rename the road again, the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is now wondering when the road was renamed as Alur Venkat Rao Road in the first place.
It so happens that neither the BBMP nor the Department of Posts have any records that show when the road was named after Alur Venkat Rao.
Noted city historian Suresh Moona said that the road was popularly known as A.V. Road. “The initials A.V. stand for both Albert Victor and Alur Venkat Rao. The road was named after Prince of Wales Albert Victor to commemorate his visit to the city to inaugurate the Glass House in Lalbagh. It was probably renamed in the late 1960s and early 1970s when a number of roads that had Colonial names were rechristened,” he pointed out.
On Monday, a delegation from BJP, including MP P.C. Mohan, MLC Ashwathnarayan, city MLAs S. Suresh Kumar, B.N. Vijaykumar and Jagadeesh Kumar, submitted a memorandum to BBMP administrator T.M. Vijaybhaskar and urged him to drop the proposal to rename the road. Their contention was that renaming the road would be an “insult” to Alur Venkat Rao, who led the Karnataka unification movement.
Conceding that the BJP-led BBMP council that passed the resolution to rename the road had not followed the protocol, Mr. Suresh Kumar told The Hindu that the BBMP should examine all proposals closely before clearing them. “
N.R. Ramesh, former Ruling Party Leader who proposed the renaming, said that during the last meeting of the BBMP council, over 30 road renaming proposals were approved by the council. The proposal to rename the main road in Chamarajpet was not in the agenda initially. “It was proposed based on a letter submitted by a private organisation. The letter did not mention that the renaming was for the Alur Venkat Rao Road,” he said.
Who is Alur Venkat Rao?
Bengaluru: Alur Venkat Rao, who is known as Karnataka Kulapurohita, was the leading figure of the Karnataka unification movement. He was also an eminent historian, a dedicated writer and journalist. He made use of the press to achieve the cause of Karnataka. When he started editing and publishing the newspaper ‘Jaya Karnataka’, he declared in its very first edition that the sole aim of the newspaper was to strive for Karnataka’s statehood.
Protocol for renaming roads
Bengaluru: Every time a road or an area is renamed, questions are raised over the procedure and logic behind the process. Names can be mooted by anyone, either the public or the BBMP council. The proposal for renaming is then published in newspapers and objections are invited. On receiving objections, they are discussed in the council for approval. In the absence of a council, the administrator takes a decision. The approved resolution is moved to Urban Development Department, Government of Karnataka which renames places in the city, an official said. After this, an intimation about the same is sent to the Department of Posts.
Previous cases of controversy
S.K. Karim Khan Road: Indiranagar 100 ft Road was renamed after the Kannada folklorist S.K. Karim Khan in 2014, even though a resolution about the same was taken in 2006.
Narasimha Raju Road: Though a road in Palace Guttahalli was named after the actor, another road (from ISKCON to Mahalakshmi Layout Swimming Pool) was named after him.
