Mumbai edit: Know these roads?

Do you know where Pasumpon Muthuramalinga Thevar Road is? Or Ahilyabai Holkar Chowk? Have you heard of Shaikh Memon Street?  And can you direct us to the Makhdoom Ali Mahimi flyover, please?

Don't be embarrassed if you can't. The fact is that 90% of Mumbaikars don't know the official names of places, and couldn't care less, which is why the police have decided, wisely, to drop their official guard and use the popular names when communicating with the public.

After Independence, many British names were replaced with Indian ones, which was understandable. But why change old Indian names or historic names? Marine Drive was not named after an Englishman called Marine; it simply describes a geographic reality. Surely some other road could have been named for Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose? (And, just as surely, we could call it Bose Road?) Charni Road was so named for the feeding ground for cattle located outside the station. The word comes from Marathi, for crying out loud. So why rename it and, in the process, insult India's first true reformer, Raja Rammohan Roy, who remains forgotten in this city?

Maybe it's time for babudom and our politicians to take a cue from the police and get in tune with the masses. Oh, and just so you know, the names we mentioned at the beginning refer, respectively, to Dharavi, Churchgate, Zaveri Bazaar, and the JJ flyover.