Mangaluru: The coastal city of Mangalore in Karnataka has already been a witness to a gruesome air crash that claimed scores of lives.
However, a news of four people dying in mid-air crash in Mangalore airport sent shock waves across the coastal city on Wednesday, bringing back the bitter memories of May 22, 2010 crash that killed 158 people.
Only a little reading brought solace to the Managloreans as they realised that it was not in ‘Namma Kudla’ that the mishap had occurred.
Not may know that there are two Mangalore in Australia- one in the state of Victoria and the other in Tasmania. While one Mangalore (Victoria) is situated 2 hours north of Melbourne and has a railway station and an airport that bears the same name, the other Mangalore in Tasmania is around 32km from Hobart and lies between the towns of Bagdad and Brighton. It is named after Mangalore in Karnataka.
The name caused all the confusion and while may theories have been floated as to why the cities share the same name, Wikipedia confirms that the Aussie cities were named after our very own Mangaluru!
Some say that the Australians had trade ties with Mangaluru (specifically the Mangalore tiles were imported by the Australians from Mangalore) while many others say that most of these towns are named by British Indians and in some cases based on the names of business establishments of the same name in the area.
Now, if one thinks of calling Mangalore as Kudla to keep the confusions at bay, then wait, there is an ‘Aussie Kudla’ too!
Yes, Kudla is a locality in the northern Adelaide suburbs, 34 km from the city centre, just south of Gawler. It is in the Town of Gawler local government area.
While Mangalore and Kudla are not the only two places in Australia that have Indian conection, one can also find places like Lucknow, Punjaub, Travancore, Malabar and Madura too in Australia that have been named after Indian cities, mentions india2australia.com
