Droupadi not my original name...,’ says new president

Dressed in a white saree with green-and-red border, Droupadi Murmu took oath as the 15th President of India on Monday. The first tribal leader to become the head of state, Murmu revealed that her first name 'Droupadi' - based on a character from the epic 'Mahabharata' - is not her original name. The name 'Droupadi', in fact, was given by her school teacher.

In an interview with an Odia video magazine, Murmu said her Santhali name is 'Puti' and that it had been changed to 'Droupadi' by a teacher 'for good'.

"Droupadi was not my original name. It was given by my teacher who hailed from another district, not from my native Mayurbhanj,” Murmu said, as quoted by news agency PTI.

Teachers in the tribal-dominated Mayurbanjh district used to travel from either Balasore or Cuttack in the 1960s, she told the magazine.

"The teacher did not like my previous name and changed it for good,” Murmu said, adding her name had been changed several times - from 'Durpadi' to 'Dorpdi' and other variations.

Names do not die in Santhali culture, Murmu said in the interview. "If a girl is born, she takes the name of her grandmother, while a son carries his grandfather’s nomenclature."