Davie has a Gandhi statue. Will a Gandhi road be next?
A bit of peace might come to a busy Broward County street, but it would be in name only.
It hasn’t become public knowledge yet, but Davie is considering renaming an 875-foot stretch of Stirling Road after Indian activist Mohandas Gandhi. The street fronts Falcon’s Lea Park, where a 7-foot-tall bronze statue of Gandhi was erected in 2012.
“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.” — Gandhi
The Kerala Samajam of South Florida, a local Indian cultural group, paid for the $50,000 statue and has advocated ever since to rename the street.
On Aug. 15, India celebrated its 75th Independence Day from British rule. “That’s why we are pushing (for the renaming)this year,” said George Varghese, the group’s president. “It’s going to happen. We are working on it.”
Gandhi was an Indian politician and social activist who advocated for absolute equality for all people. His non-violent resistance is thought to have influenced modern civil disobedience movements led by Martin Luther King Jr. and former South Africa President Nelson Mandela.
“I will not let anyone walk through my mind with their dirty feet.” — Gandhi Gandhi became the leader of the movement to free India from British rule, but an extremist assassinated him in 1948 over his tolerance for Muslims.
Varghese said every major city in India has a street named for Gandhi, but few exist in the United States. Gandhi Drive has been named in Boulder, Colorado; Lakeland, Florida; Crawfordsville, Indiana; Durham, North Carolina; and Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina, according to AAA, the auto club group.
The Broward County Commission was scheduled to sign off on the name change Tuesday, but the town asked commissioners to hold off since it hadn’t been publicly approved or even discussed yet.
Phillip Holste, Davie’s assistant town administrator, said there is no timetable for the discussion. He said a 10,000-square-foot portion of the 3-acre park that is home to the statue is referred to as Gandhi Square.
“Nonviolence is a weapon of the strong.” — Gandhi
Colored step stones leading to the statue represent the steps Gandhi took in his “lifetime struggle to achieve freedom to his people,” according to an Indian publication, Outlook.
Renaming a portion of Stirling Road would be important to the Indian-American community, Varghese said. “When we drive we can see his name and remember what he did, that great person.”