What is the old name of UP?

Uttar Pradesh was previously known as the United Provinces (officially the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh), a name it bore during British colonial rule from 1902 until India's independence and subsequent reorganization as a republic in 1950. The United Provinces were formed through the administrative merger of the Agra Presidency and the Oudh (Awadh) Province, consolidating British territories in northern India under unified governance. This colonial-era name was intentionally replaced with "Uttar Pradesh" in January 1950 as part of the newly independent India's policy to adopt indigenous language names for states rather than maintaining English colonial designations. The name Uttar Pradesh (meaning "Northern Province" in Hindi) was chosen to reflect both the region's geographical location and the adoption of Hindi as an official language.

Before British consolidation, the region's nomenclature was even more varied: the eastern portion was known as Oudh or Awadh (a semi-autonomous kingdom before British annexation in 1856), while the western areas were part of the Agra Presidency or earlier Mughal administrative divisions called subahs (provinces). Going further back historically, various parts of what is now UP were known by ancient names—Aryavarta (abode of the Aryans) in Vedic texts, Madhyadesha (middle country), or references to specific kingdoms like Kosala (around Ayodhya), Kashi (Varanasi region), and Magadha borders. However, these ancient terms described regions rather than constituting official administrative names for the entire territory. For practical purposes, when discussing UP's "old name" in modern historical context, the answer is the United Provinces—a designation that lasted nearly half a century and is still remembered by older generations and in historical documents, while the ancient regional names represent deeper historical layers of identification rather than unified nomenclature for the current state boundaries.