Move to rename Aurangabad is hot button issue as municipal polls loom

Located on hilly upland terrain in the Deccan Traps, Aurangabad in the Marathwada region is the fourth-biggest city and the tourism capital of Maharashtra. Some 360 km from Mumbai, the city has a rich history as it changed hands between kingdoms several times.

But that history has now pushed Aurangabad to the frontline of Maharashtra politics as parties spar over the move to rename it.

The demand to rename Aurangabad as Sambhajinagar has created a mini-crisis within the three-party Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government, with the BJP watching keenly for a political opportunity.

The Shiv Sena, led by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, is rooting for the name change, the state Congress is vehemently opposing it, and Sharad Pawar’s NCP isn’t taking a public stand one way or the other.

Sambhaji Maharaj was the son and successor of Chhatrapati Shivaji. Sambhaji was captured and killed by Mughal emperor Aurangzeb, after whom Aurangabad, which was earlier called Fatehnagar, was named.

It needs to be mentioned here that elections are due to the Aurangabad Municipal Corporation. Mumbai, Thane, Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Nashik and Nagpur corporations are also set for elections in 2021-22, and these elections could reflect the mood of Maharashtra voters midway to 2024. Not surprisingly, the Shiv Sena has also renewed the demand to rename Osmanabad district as Dharashiv.

The Samajwadi Party, another ally of MVA, and Assaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM, which have a significant presence in Aurangabad, have opposed the renaming.

On the other hand, the Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi, led by Prakash Ambedkar, the grandson of Babasaheb Ambedkar, has demanded that Pune be renamed Sambhajinagar.

The BJP has taunted Shiv Sena for not being able to go ahead with the move due to its ties with Congress. The demand for renaming Aurangabad was first made by the late Bal Thackeray in the 1990s, but the Shiv Sena-BJP government of 1995-99 did not go ahead with it, nor did it happen during the Sena-BJP government of 2014-19.

Politically, it is significant for the Shiv Sena to do so now as its Hindutva image has been dented after it allied with Congress and NCP.

By not joining issue, Sharad Pawar has made it clear that all he is interested in is the stability of the MVA dispensation. “We have no issues...you say Sambhajinagar or you say Dharashiv...I don’t take the matter seriously...so I never commented anything on this,” he has said.

Thackeray, in his official tweets, has started referring to the two cities as “Sambhajinagar-Aurangabad” and “Dharashiv-Osmanabad” – a development that has rattled the Congress.

State Revenue Minister and Maharashtra Congress president Balasaheb Thorat had repeatedly said his party is fundamentally opposed to renaming of cities and prefers to focus on basic amenities and infrastructure. “The alliance works on the common minimum programme (CMP), and renaming was not part of the agenda,” he said.

Thackeray reacted by saying, “Aurangzeb was not a secular person. While our agenda has the word secular in it, a person like Aurangzeb does not fit into it.”

NCP leaders, including Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar and Home Minister Anil Deshmukh, have said the three parties would sort out the issue.

Taking a dig at the developments, Leader of Opposition Devendra Fadnavis said, "Instead of this indirect tweet, they should show the courage to actually effect the name change. Right now, this is just shadow-boxing by the leaders of MVA…This is a nautanki sarkar."

It will be a difficult thing to handle for the MVA, given the fact that Aurangabad has a very long history and at different periods of time, it has been known by different names. Plus, the demography could be critical in settling the issue.

It has seen the influence and rule of various dynasties – Satavahana, Vakataka, Chalukya, Rashtrakuta, Yadava, Khilji, Tuglaq, Bahamani Sultanate, Nizam Shahi, Deccan Sultans under Mughals and Hyderabad Nizams and Marathas and the British.

The strategic location of Aurangabad as an entry point in ancient Dakshinapatha was the main reason why the region witnessed the rise and fall of so many dynasties.

The ancient town of Paithan on the banks of the Godavari river is located in Aurangabad. In historical and medieval times, it was known as Pratisthana, which was known for its Buddhist, Jain and Brahmanical literature. From the Deogiri or Devagiri, the Yadavas ruled areas between Tungabhadra and Narmada rivers covering parts of Maharashtra, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh.

Alauddin Khilji defeated Yadava king Krishna in 1296 and placed it under the control of slave-general Malik Kafur. In 1327, Muhammad bin Tughlaq, who was the Sultan of Delhi, shifted the capital to Deogiri and renamed it Daulatabad. In 1334, however, he moved the capital back to Delhi.

In 1499, Daulatabad became a part of the Ahmednagar Sultanate. In 1610, a new city named Khirki or Khaḍkī was established there as the capital of the Sultanate by Siddhi leader Malik Ambar, who was brought to India as a slave but rose to become a popular prime minister of the Sultanate.

Malik Ambar’s son Fateh Khan renamed Daulatabad after himself and it became Fatehnagar. But in 1636, Aurangzeb, then the Mughal viceroy of the Deccan region, annexed the city and in 1653 renamed it "Aurangabad" and made it the capital of the Deccan region of the Mughal Empire.

Meanwhile, senior Congress leader Husain Dalwai, a former Maharashtra minister, has said that there is also a demand to rename Aurangabad after Malik Ambar, who was one of the founders of the city. “We will take the views of the Muslim community on this, have discussions and then take a call,” he said, adding however that it is Pune that should be renamed Sambhajinagar since the Maratha warrior was born there and his grave, too, is in that city.