Kannada Names To Be Changed In Kerala Villages? Karnataka Leaders Object

Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa wrote to Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan: "The existing names (of the villages) were predominantly from Kannada and Tulu languages... Some of the names of these villages have a long history of several centuries"

Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa has written to his Kerala counterpart Pinarayi Vijayan to request him to stop change of original Kannada names of villages in the border districts of Kasaragod and Manjeshwar.  Mr Yediyurappa's predecessor, former Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy, has also written to Mr Vijayan, asking that the renaming process be halted. "The existing names (of the villages) were predominantly from Kannada and Tulu languages. In some places, it is a mixture of Kannada and Tulu names. Some of the names of these villages have a long history of several centuries," Mr Yediyurappa wrote to the Kerala Chief Minister. "I also feel that the Kerala government may not have the intention to change the names of these villages and this may have been a unilateral decision of the local bodies of these villages," his letter added. The Kerala government has denied there is any such move.  "Kerala has no plans to make any such changes," Local Self Government Minister MV Govindan told NDTV on phone.