Amid the ongoing tussle between Shiv Sena and Congress over the name change of Aurangabad airport, Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Friday, January 8, said that Mughal emperor Aurangazeb was not secular.
Elaborating on his tweet that referred Aurangabad as Sambhaji Nagar, Thackeray said while coalition’s agenda adheres to secularism, Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb does not fit into it.
When it was pointed out that he had referred to Aurangabad as Sambhaji Nagar on his official Twitter handle over the past two days, Thackeray said: “What new thing have I done? I have done what we have been saying for over so many years and what the Shiv Sena supremo (Bal Thackeray) had said.”
This statement comes a day after Congress warned him to avoid this name for the city. Moreover, a few days ago, the SP MLA Abu Azmi wrote to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar urging them to stop politics around changing the name of Aurangabad.
"These days, politics is being played by changing the name of Aurangabad. If changing the name (of a city) helps in its development, then names must be changed. But in that case, Raigad should be named Sambhaji Nagar and Maharashtra be named after Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, who was an idol of the harmony between Hindus and Muslims," Azmi said in a letter written on January 5.
A controversy has broken out over the state government's plans to change the name of Aurangabad to Sambhaji Nagar as Congress has been constantly opposing it. Despite that, on January 6, Thackeray urged the Centre to issue a notification at the earliest for renaming the Aurangabad Airport after Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj.
Earlier, Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut made it clear that the Maharashtra government was clear on renaming the city after Sambhaji, the warrior son of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj.
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