I have had the advantage (?) of living in Bombay (Mumbai to the newbies there), and can talk at length about the difference between natives and outsiders. Unfortunately, the jests (such feebly ironic ones as there are in all this) will be lost on an English-speaking audience. Perhaps, therefore, it would be best merely to write down my favourite.
As background, India has been through various patriotic convulsions, during which periods it was deemed necessary to reject all signs of the Raj. The change of name from Bombay to Mumbai is one such manifestation. In any case, the 'natives' themselves, bewildered by (or not interested in) these changes, have often stuck to the old names, and their children use them too. Only newcomers to the city, and public transportation, use the 'new; names.
So...
One of the more important junctions in Bombay city, close to the diamond dealing district (and equally close to the notorious red light area, but you don't want to know about that) used to have an Opera House on one corner. Over time this large building evolved into a cinema house, and thence to the ramshackle home of rats that it currently seems to be. Through all that time the locals (all 12 million of them?) persisted in calling that junction 'Opera House'.
In a fit of PC, the authorities, sometime in the '70s, I think, decided to award the title of that junction to some cultural luminary. It was thenceforward officially titled Gnyanacharya Pandit Vishnu Digambar Paluskar Chowk'.
So all the buses have it as a title (if that is their terminus or starting point). And in all official correspondence it is referred to as 'Paluskar Chowk'. But no native ever calls it anything but Opera House.
For those in the least bit interested, the full name translates out as:
Sage-of-knowledge Scholar Vishnu Digambar Paluskar (his actual name - pretty obviously Maharashtrian) Square.
cheer
the sunshine warrior
ps. Don't get me started on SV Road versus Ghodbunder Road, Vallabhbhai Patel Road versus Linking Road, and the like. At least Alexander Graham Bell Road is considered politically correct enough to remain!
