Patnitop or Patni Top is a hilltop tourist location in Udhampur district in Jammu and Kashmir state of India on National Highway 44, 112 km from Jammu on the way from Udhampur to Srinagar.

Read also: Historical Places to visit in Udhampur

Time changes everything, from geography to geology to terminology and what not! Languages change and so do the name of places. Gurugram became Gurgaon before being renamed as Gurugram, New Amsterdam became New York etc.

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Patnitop, a popular tourist destination of Jammu Kashmir too was not always called as Patnitop. It is said that its original name was “Pattan da Talab” meaning Pond of the Princess. In olden times a pond existed in the meadows and some princess often used to have her bath there. Part of the pond still exists near the youth hostel. The Britishers probably could not get the name correctly in their revenue records, and over the years it changed from “Patan Da Talab” to Patnitop.