We met a friend from Pondicherry, India and were discussing about politics of that Indian Union Territory. We were talking about Pondicherry’s far flung territories which are unique to this former French colony. The union territory of Pondicherry has its territories across South Indian states – “Yenam” in “Andhra Pradesh”, “Mahe” in “Kerala” and “Karaikal” – “Tamil Nadu”.
Later on searching more on this, we came across few interesting facts about “Mahe”.
We found many places named “Mahe” across the globe,
- Mahe, A town in the Union Territory of Pondicherry, India.
- Mahe, The largest island of Seychelles.
- Mahembourg(Mauritius) - The capital of Grand Port district, Mauritius.
On closer scrutiny we found most of them were former French colonies. So why so many places in former French colonies were named “Mahe”?
Reason is, to honor a man called, “Betrand-Francois Mahe de La Bourdonnais”. This man served as a soldier and administrator in the “French East India Company” during the early eighteenth century. He is well known for his battle field exploits during Anglo-French conflicts in the Indian sub continent and also as an able administrator of “Mauritius” and “Reunion” during colonial period. So to honor his service all these places were named after him.
Surprisingly, though there are many European colonists like “Robert Clive” of “Great Britian”(who brought total India under British control) and “Hernan Cortes” of Spain (who brought South American continent under Spanish crown), no one has achieved the distinction of having so many places named after them as
“Betrand-Francois Mahe de La Bourdonnais” did.
Few more interesting facts,
- Mahe, India is the birth place of “Sixth Sense” fame Hollywood director
“Manoj Shyamalan”.
- There is a controversy in Kerala, India on whether
“Betrand-Francois Mahe de La Bourdonnais” actually gave his name to the place “Mahe” or he had adopted the original name of the place “Mahe”(“Mayaazhi” in “Malayalam language”) as a part of his name and popularized it.
If readers have any additional details on “Mahe” please post your comments.
