Tile Wali Masjid: Claims, counter claims not new

LUCKNOW: The ‘mosque-overtemple’ claim challenging the existence of ‘Tile Wali Masjid’ is not new, nor is the BJP leaders’ and right-wing activists’ demand to re- name Lucknow to Lakshmanpur, as they strongly believe that the erstwhile city of nawabs was established by Lord Ram’s brother Lakshman.

The ‘perennial’ belief was further fuelled in 2018 when BJP veteran Lalji Tandon’s book— ‘Ankaha Lucknow’ or ‘Untold Lucknow’ got published. The book further fomented the controversy over its claim that Lucknow’s biggest Sunni mosque – the ‘Teele Wali Masjid’ was built by Mughal emperor Aurangzeb over the ‘Lakshman Teela’ – a raised platform believed to be christened after Lord Ram’s brother Lakshman.

The book also said that the city was originally named Lakshmanavati, then Lakshmanpur and then Lakhnavati, before it finally became Lucknow. The book claimed about the existence of a ‘Shesh Gufa’ on the Lakshman Teela - proof of Lucknow’s link with most politically driven. However, he agreed to the fact that the mosque came up during Aurangzeb’s regime.

Recently, the ‘perennial issue’ to rename Lucknow to Lakshmanpur gained momentum again when chief minister Yogi Adityanath, while welcoming Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his visit to Lucknow, tweeted: ‘Sheshavatar Bhagwan Lakshman ki pawan nagri Lucknow mein aapka swagat aur abhinandan’. Interestingly, the tweet also kicked off the speculations that Yogi Government, known for renaming, was set to re-name Lucknow.

So far, the Yogi government has re-christened Faizabad Railway Station as Ayodhya Cantt and Mughalsarai Junction as Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyay Junction. Also, it changed the name of Allahabad to Prayagraj and hinted at the possibilities of changing the names of Sultanpur, Mirzapur, Aligarh, Firozabad and Mainpuri. Besides, the saffron brigade has also demanded to re-christen Agra as Agravan, Muzaffarnagar as Luxmi Nagar, Miyanganj (a town in Unnao district) as Mayaganj, Aligarh as Harigarh