Mumbai's Elphinstone Road station renamed as Prabhadevi

It was Shiv Sena which had first made the demand to rename some suburban stations in Mumbai arguing they carried "colonial" names.

Mumbai, July 4: The Western Railway (WR) on Tuesday renamed the Elphinstone Road station as Prabhadevi within days of the Central Railway (CR) renaming the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus as the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus.

The WR issued a notification to this effect. The station, which was named after Lord Elphinstone, the Governor of Bombay Presidency from 1853 to 1860, has now been renamed in honour of a local deity.

"The notification about the renaming of the station has been issued and steps are being taken to make necessary changes, including updating it in our system," said the chief public relations officer of the WR, Ravinder Bhakar. "It will take almost a week to complete all the formalities of changing the name," he added. The WR said the code initials of the renamed station would be- PBHD.

It was Shiv Sena which had first made the demand to rename some suburban stations in Mumbai arguing they carried "colonial" names. In December last year, the Maharashtra legislature had approved a Bill to rename the Elphinstone Road station, the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) and the Mumbai airport.

Welcoming the renaming of the station, Shiv Sena MP Arvind Sawant told PTI, "It's good that our demands are being accepted. But we will still pursue this issue (of renaming more stations) with the state government and the Railway Ministry." "I have demanded that several suburban stations need to be renamed as a mark of respect to the local luminaries.

I have demanded that Currey Road station be named as Lalbaugh, Sandhurst Road station as Dongri, Reay Road as Ghodapdeo, Cotton Green as Kalachowki, Mumbai Central as Nana Chowk, Grant Road as Gaondevi, etc. I am confident that our demands will be met for the larger public interest," Sawant added. Sena's demand had received the support of all the major parties of the state.

The Maharashtra Assembly had unanimously passed a resolution to this effect last year. The BJP-led government had sought insertion of the word "Maharaj" in both the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus and the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport.

In May this year, the Centre had given its nod to the recommendations of the state government. Last week, Mumbai's iconic railway station, Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus was rechristened with addition of an honorific 'Maharaj' after 'Shivaji' in its old name. The British-era landmark was Victoria Terminus before it was named after the Maratha warrior king a couple of decades back.

PTI