California in Karnataka? Rather, Delhi in Illinois

The allure of foreign addresses that has led developers to build Cupertino, Silicon Valley, Palo Alto and Napa Valley and other Californian doppelgangers in Karnataka is of a piece with the pan-Indian trend for such ‘imported’ names.

While there seems to be a particular preference for appellations from Florida and California — from Palm Beach to Malibu —for their dream condominiums and gated enclaves, Indian developers are quite catholic when it comes to borrowing US names, as they are with monikers from other parts of the world.

It would be unkind, however, to dub this as an infatuation peculiar to Indian realty as the human tendency to hanker for faraway places is long-standing and manifest. And, appropriately, nowhere is it more apparent than in the US.

An enumeration of just its states that have names beginning with ‘New’ — York, Jersey, Hampshire and Mexico — is indicative of this predisposition, and it would be fair to say that much of the world finds representation as counties, cities, towns and villages.

Indeed, the fact that there are quite a few Delhis in the US, as well as Bombay, Madras, Agra, Patna, Shimla, Indore and Lucknow, should enthuse Indians who may be bashful about their spanking new California-in-Karnataka and Florida-in-Noida abodes. We can safely say they started it.