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The Union Cabinet led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has given the green light to change the name of Kerala to ‘Keralam’. Once the Union Cabinet has approved this, the President of India will send a Bill called the Kerala (Alteration of Name) Bill, 2026 to the Kerala State Legislative Assembly to gather its opinions according to article 3 of the Indian Constitution. After the Kerala State Legislative Assembly shares its thoughts, the Government of India will proceed with further steps, and the President's approval will be sought for presenting the Kerala (Alteration of Name) Bill, 2026 in Parliament to officially change the name of the state from ‘Kerala’ to ‘Keralam’. This name change is occurring before the state assembly elections, the schedule for which has not yet been announced by the Election Commission of India (ECI). In 2023 and 2024, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan introduced a resolution to rename the state from “Kerala” to “Keralam” in all languages listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution. This resolution received approval two times from the assembly, following the Union Home Ministry's review of the first resolution, which recommended some technical adjustments.

The resolutions presented by the government of Kerala aimed to change the state's name from Kerala to ‘Keralam’ in accordance with article 3 of the Indian Constitution. “Our state is known as ‘Keralam’ in Malayalam. States were established based on language on November 1, 1956. November 1 is also celebrated as Kerala Piravi Day. Since the fight for National Independence, there has been a strong call for the creation of a unified Kerala for those who speak Malayalam. Yet, the name listed in the First Schedule of the Constitution remains as ‘Kerala’. This Assembly unanimously urges the Central Government to urgently modify the name to ‘Keralam’ following Article 3 of the Constitution,” stated the resolutions. In 2016, when Gurgaon was renamed Gurugram, the RSS suggested that the Union government rename Kerala to ‘Keralam’, Ahmedabad to ‘Amaravati’, Hyderabad to ‘Bhagyanagar’, and Aurangabad to ‘Sambhajinagar’. Gurgaon was renamed Gurugram to honor Guru Dronacharya, a teacher mentioned in the Mahabharata, who was granted the land by his students.