British newspaper The Independent is going back to using "Bombay" instead of "Mumbai" when referring to India's financial capital. Editor Amol Rajan said the move was a stand against the "closed-minded view" of right-wing Hindu nationalists in India, reported AFP. Rajan, who was born in Kolkata and raised in London, told BBC Radio, "The whole point of Bombay is of an open, cosmopolitan port city, the gateway of India that's open to the world. If you call it what Hindu nationalists want you to call it, you essentially do their work for them."

Bombay was officially renamed Mumbai in 1995 after the ruling Shiv Sena campaigned extensively to drop the colonial name for the port city and officially adopt the Marathi name to appease the community. Without directly referring to the Shiv Sena or its coalition partner, the Centre-ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, Rajan said he prefers to side with India's tradition that has been open to the world, rather than the one that's been closed and is in ascendance in the country.