Kerala’s name may soon change to Keralam as the state assembly passed a resolution in that direction by an overwhelming majority on June 24. In this resolution, it was said to amend Schedule 1 of the Indian Constitution so as to change the name of the state from 'Kerala' to 'Keralam'.
In the resolution presented in the Assembly, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan called for the implementation of Article 3 of the Indian Constitution to implement this change in the First Schedule.
Notably, Schedule 1 of the constitution consists of the names of the states and UT and Article 3 deals with the formation of new States and the alteration of areas, boundaries or names of existing States.
Proposal brought last year
It is worth noting that this is not the first time the Kerala government has come up with such a proposal. Last year also, the state government passed a resolution in this direction, However, it was returned by the central government as there were procedural issues. In an earlier resolution, Kerala had sought to amend the names across all the languages listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution to 'Keralaam'. To this, the Union Home Ministry suggested amending the First Schedule only, leading to an amendment in the resolution passed by Kerala on August 9, 2023.
Malayalam name will be 'Keralaam'
CM Vijayan has said that despite the Malayalam name of the state being 'Keralaam', it is officially recorded as 'Kerala'. The proposal aims to link the official name with the Malayalam pronunciation. During the discussion, N. Samsudin of the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) proposed an amendment to the resolution to prevent rejection by the Centre, but the proposal was eventually rejected by the House. He also demanded action against officials who were responsible for the "lapse" in the original proposal.
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