THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Have you been to ‘Vilinam,’ ‘Chirayinkal,’ ‘Malayinkal,’ or ‘Kattakkal’ in the capital district? These are among the more than 3,000 place names in Thiruvananthapuram documented erroneously as part of the Survey of India’s toponymy mandate. These entries are now being corrected, thanks to the efforts of the Kerala Bhasha Institute, which has been tasked with proofreading and rectifying errors in SoI’s mapping of Thiruvananthapuram and other districts.
Most names required corrections, historian Vellanad Ramachandran said. “Many places were wrongly spelt, while old British versions were retained for some. Vizhinjam was listed as ‘Vilinam,’ Chirayinkeezhu as ‘Chirayinkal,’ Malayinkeezhu as ‘Malayinkal’, and ‘Kattakada’ as ‘Kattakkal,” according to Ramachandran, who has been assigned by the Bhasha Institute to cross-verify names recorded in English.
As many as six taluks in the district – Thiruvananthapuram, Nedumangad, Chirayinkeezhu, Kattakada, Neyyattinkara and Varkala – were documented. Inaccuracies in mapping arose, as survey officials, most of whom were from outside the state, documented the places using British-era names or by misspelling them. “While Malayinkal, Chirayinkal and Kattakkal were British-era names ‘Nedumanangad’, ‘Vellaarada’ and ‘Vilinam’ were spelling errors due to limited knowledge of the region,” he said.
The Bhasha Institute took on the job of correcting names after being approached by central government authorities through the state government. “It’s a project managed by the Survey of India. We were entrusted with proofreading. Given our workload with other programmes, we delegated the work to Ramachandran who is an expert in Nedumangad’s history,” said M Sathyan, director, Bhasha Institute.
Ramachandran pointed out that Malabar-based staff members of the institute too struggled to identify and verify locations in Thiruvananthapuram. “Place names carry immense historical and cultural significance. Malayalam is a language that has evolved over the years. Identifying the names of places in Thiruvananthapuram requires proficiency in Tamil, given the region’s shared history. Not everybody is proficient in it,” added Ramachandran.
According to another official at the Bhasha Institute, the corrections are being guided by directives issued through circulars to ensure accuracy. As the survey progresses, other districts will be covered, with Thiruvananthapuram being the only one completed so far.
SoI’s toponymy mandate is essential for drawing administrative boundaries and vertical data collection.
“In this process, officials collect field names, initially recorded as audio files. When these names are documented, there can be discrepancies due to officials coming from different regions of the country and the inherent challenges in recognising various accents and dialects,” a SoI official said.
According to an official with the Bhasha Institute, proofreading of five more districts – Kollam, Pathanamthitta, Alappuzha, Kottayam, and Kasargod – will be carried out in the next phase.