In late modern period the term Alta Italia ('High Italy') was widely used, for example by the Comitato di Liberazione Nazionale Alta Italia during the second World War. Starting from the 1960s the term Padania was sometimes used as geographical synonym of Po Valley. The term appeared sparingly until the early 1990s, when Lega Nord, a federalist and, at times, separatist political party in Italy, proposed Padania as a possible name for an independent state in Northern Italy.