Now, village head in Ballia wants his panchayat renamed

VARANASI : Close on the heels of a renaming spree by the Yogi Adityanath government, a village head in Ballia district has submitted a proposal to change the name of his native Abdulpur Madari gram panchayat to Hanumat Nagar.

Abdulpur Madari is part of the Belthara Road assembly constituency represented by the BJP’s Dhananjay Kanaujia. The village has a population of around 1,800.

Village head Sukhsagar Singh said, “I have submitted a proposal for changing the name of Abdulpur Madari to Hanumat Nagar. He (Dhananjay Kanaujia) has accepted the proposal. Our village has a mixed population, including Rajputs, Yadavs, Rajbhars and several other castes. But there is no Muslim in the village.”

The MLA is expected to forward the proposal to the state government which will take a final view on it.

Kanaujia said, “The proposal to change the name of the village will be tabled before the chief minister Yogi Adityanath and the rural development minister for their approval to initiate the process for the same.”

Explaining how the move came about, Kanaujia said, “I held a meeting with the locals around a month back on the matter. The locals unanimously demanded a change in the name of the village. Thereafter, a proposal was sought from the village head. He submitted the proposal.”

Kanaujia said since there was no minority community family in the village, it was appropriate to change its name.

“I will seek proposals (for renaming) from the heads of all such villages, where the minority population is zero and villages are named after Muslims,” Kanaujia said.

Rakesh Singh, a local, said, “The name of my village is Abdulpur Madari. It gives the impression that the village is Muslim dominated. My village should be renamed as Hanumat Nagar.”

The Yogi government recently changed the names of Allahabad to Prayagraj, Mughalsarai to Deendayal Upadhyay Nagar and Faizabad district to Ayodhya.