Though five years have elapsed since the President of India approved The Orissa (Alternation of Name) Bill changing ‘Orissa’ to ‘Odisha’, the name of the High Court of Orissa is yet to undergo a change to complete the Constitutional formalities.
Interestingly, the Odisha Government has woken up after receiving several letters from the Central Government to follow up the formalities.
Notably, after four years’ struggle, The Orissa Bill and the Constitution (113th Amendment) Bill were approved by the President on November 4, 2011. Since then, Orissa has changed to Odisha and Oriya to Odia.
As there were some Central guidelines for a change of the name of the Orissa High Court, it was put on hold and the State Government had to follow up the procedure.
Unfortunately, no visible sign of interest was seen despite several letters from the Union Ministry of law and Justice to the State law Department.
At last, the Union law Minister wrote a DO letter (K-11018/5/1997-U.S.I/11.11.2016) to the Odisha Government asking it to take necessary steps to change the name of the Orissa High Court to Odisha High Court.
According to law, the law Department should seek opinion forwarding the Centre’s letter to the State Home Department which has been followed 20 days after the receipt of the letter. The letter was forwarded to Home Department three days ago.
