Italy, Sweden, Nigeria...a bit of globe in Meghalaya
Come election season and voters with offbeat names queue up before the polling booths.
In Short
- In Umniuh Tmar, villagers have names such as Nigeria, Very Much, Group and Sweater among others
- Some say villagers choose the names without knowing the meaning of the words
- Umniuh Tmar, close to the Indo-Bangladesh border, has a voter strength of 1,146
Tucked away in a corner in the Northeast, some 80 km from Meghalaya capital Shillong lies Umniuh Tmar. A village that is famous in the region for its cleanliness and high literacy rate.
Another reason why Umniuh Tmar hits the headlines every few years or so is the completely arbitrary names denizens go by. Here's a sample: Thailand, Nigeria, Bombay, Vellore, Experience, I Have Been Delivered...
Back in 1597 a distraught Juliet had asked her lover Romeo: "What's in a name?" More than 400 years later villagers in Umniuh Tmar are echoing what the Bard of Avon had so eloquently written.
People here have a rather eclectic range of names -- from being named after countries to using nouns, verbs as the first name.
Take countries for one. There are names like Italy, Sweden, Indonesia, Thailand, Nigeria and Tibet.
Closer home the names spread across the country: Goa, Kashmir, Tripura, Dispur, Bombay, Vellore and Mysore among others.
Then there are these words as the first name: I Have Been Delivered, Very Much, Agreement, Request, Liar, Wireless, Experience, Release, Dial, Circle, Carefully, Sample, Evening, Incharge, Spot, Symbol, System, Dicipline, Enjoy, Purify, Correction...
What about these Everest, Accountant, Festival, Journalist, History, Carefully, Group, Sweater, Beautiful, Unity, Godness, Holiness, City, Holyland, Village, Agenda and Satisfy?
And if you thought that the villagers of Umniuh Tmar don't take their duties as citizens seriously here are what two women are called: Parliament Ryngnga, 29, and her 24-year-old sister Assembly Ryngnga.
The reason behind these rather outré names is lost in the maze of neural network of the human consciousness. Some though have proffered the theory that villagers in Umniuh Tmar simply love the English language and scroll it for names.
As for the meaning? Aw, give me a break!
Voting for the two Lok Sabha seats in Meghalaya - Shillong and Tura - took place on April 11. Umniuh Tmar village falls under Shillong Lok Sabha constituency in Meghalaya's East Khasi Hills district.
Umniuh Tmar, close to the Indo-Bangladesh border, has a voter strength of 1,146 with two polling booths - 37 Umniuh B and 38 Tmar.
In Tmar polling station, there are 456 voters including 207 male and 249 female voters and while in Umniuh B polling station there are 690 female voters.
A total of 18,92,716 voters in Meghalaya will exercise their franchise.
(With inputs from Hemanta Kumar Nath in Assam)