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This is an archive article published on June 11, 2020

Memes flood social media as Tamil Nadu changes English spellings of over 1000 places

While people welcomed the move, they questioned the timing of the announcement. Many criticised the government for prioritising the changing of names during the pandemic.

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People largely remained confused over the phonetic makeover of the places and dubbed it over-complicated.

In a sudden move, Tamil Nadu government Wednesday issued a notification changing the English spellings of 1018 places in the state to match their pronunciations in Tamil. While the names of some places were reverted to their original Tamil names, others underwent a spelling change. Soon, the new names of the towns and cities started trending online.

While people welcomed the move, they questioned the timing of the announcement. Many criticised the government for prioritising the changing of names during the pandemic. Many also said that while the reverting to Tamil names was welcome, their complicated English spellings weren’t helping.

Many are now sharing hilarious memes and jokes about the changing of names. Here are some examples:

A government release said that during the Tamil Nadu budget allocation session for 2018-2019, an announcement had been made about changing the names of places and towns in Tamil Nadu so that they have the same phonetics in English and Tamil. The revised names and spellings were finalised following deliberations by a committee appointed to oversee the changes.

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