What’s in a Name????

How much significance does a name has in a country where people name their children after famous personalities with the hope of getting noticed and thus escaping from the curse of extreme poverty. If you have ever wondered about the relevance of your name in your life, well, this post is for you. Others can also join- who knows, this post may actually inspire you to find more about your name.

The inspiration for this post came from an article in a magazine, in which I read about a father in Uttar Pradesh who named his kids after political leaders, hoping for deliverance from poverty. I was actually moved at the plight of the family – which consisted of 8 kids and their parents. The kids have been named after famous political leaders which include Mulayam Singh, Kalyan Singh and Jayalalitha. Their father who earns a very meagre income hopes that the names of his children would shape their destiny and make them as popular as their namesakes. I sincerely hope that God will show them a way out of this tough situation and bless the children to do something great in life.

So what has all this to do with our topic of discussion??? Well, our name has always been special for us. It is a part of our identity regardless of whether our name is one which is very common or one which is very rare (and confusing for others). When we try to get an e-mail id in gmail or yahoo, we get astonished at the number of people who share the same name with us (and has therefore taken all possible permutations and combinations of our name as their mail id). There are also these lucky ones who have these uncommon names and who thus manage to get a mail id very easily.

And then today, people are coming up with ‘strange’ and uncommon names for their children. This has been my personal experience as my cousins are all coming up with long names for their children and as the family grows bigger, remembering the names has become really difficult for me. So in order to pay them back, I’ve already started thinking of some unusual names 🙂

Shabana Azmi

Now talking about my name – I was never really happy about it. For me, my name sounded a bit long and then the ‘ana’- people can easily cook up many nicknames (One of the most popular one in school was ‘banana’). I always used to complain about my name to my parents and we sometimes used to end up in small fights. They would suggest that I could change my name anytime and I used to become quiet. Well, we have choices on all important aspects of our life, but we are left without a choice in the matter of our own name, an important part of our identity.

So I started wondering about my name. I knew that I shared my name with ‘Shabana Azmi’, the famous film actor and social worker (I have an uncle who always addresses me as ‘Shabana Azmi’). And then Javed Akhtar and Farhan Akhtar have always been like a part of my family. I have always been a fan of my husband’s lyrics and have always admired my son’s films.

I learnt that my parents had actually thought of another name for me – ‘Fiza(that reminds me of  the Hindi film ‘Fiza’ with Karishma Kapoor in the title role). It was my grandfather who suggested the name ‘Shabana’ for me. But when I asked about the meaning of my name, nobody was very sure. So I decided to google and find out.

And I was successful. I discovered that ‘Shabana’ is a Persian word that means ‘famous’. I was equally surprised and excited. I was amazed when I realised that my name has actually got something to do with my life.  I was quite well known in my school as I’d been the head girl of the school in my eleventh standard and had also been the school topper in tenth and twelfth standards. And now in college, I am popular because of my notes. I was surprised at the close association of my name with my life. I don’t know anything about what life has in store for me in the future, but as of now, my name signifies something that has been both a boon and a bane for me – ‘popularity’.

Thus my name proved to be a very important part of my destiny. This new realisation has been really wonderful. I’ve stopped complaining about my name and have even started feeling proud of it. So when are you going to find out how special your name is???