TCN News
The famous cricket stadium Feroz Shah Kotla Cricket stadium located at Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi will be now renamed after former Union Minister Arun Jaitley as announced by Delhi and District Cricket Association on Tuesday.
The formal renaming will take place on 12th September. Feroz Shah Kotla cricket stadium established in 1883, is the second oldest cricket stadium in India and is one of the best international cricket stadium with total capacity of 48000 persons. Earlier it was a fortress built in 1354.
The stadium has seen several historical cricket matches wherein cricketers have made world records and gained popularity and won accolades.
It is named after Feroz Shah Kotla also spelt as Firoz Shah Kotla was the sultan of Delhi sultanate and during his regime founded many cities around Delhi such as Jaunpur, Firozpur, Hissar, Fatehabad and Ferozabad.
Feroz Shah of the Tughlaq dynasty improved the infrastructure of his empire building canals, rest houses, reservoirs, digging wells and building hospitals. He also lowered the tax rates and even stopped harsh punishments.
The Delhi Cricket association decided to rename the stadium to honour Jaitley who served as the president of DDCA (Delhi and District Cricket Association) in 1999 to 2013 and is believed to have been a cricket fan.
TwoCircles.net spoke to some persons to know what they felt about this recent name change under the current BJP rule. BJP is credited with changing names of cities and institutes.
Lateef Mohammed Khan, Secretary of Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee, Hyderabad, said, “This is an attempt to erase the cultural identity of Muslims and their heritage. This seems the agenda of RSS who think that by renaming Muslim names and imposing such things they can erase the identity of Muslims. But India is a multicultural country and these extremists will never succeed.”
An advocate of High court who wished to remain anonymous said, “This is just another part of the BJP agenda to renaming things which appear to be associated with Muslims. A clear ploy to sideline Muslims. “
“The BJP had in its agenda, things which are detrimental to the interests of Muslims and examples are galore starting from mob lynching in the guise of protecting cow, renaming anything having far or near relation to Mughals, Ram Mandir, and Uniform Civil Code. They have been successful in implementing a part of their agenda and a few are going to be implemented soon. No wonder they want a Hindu Rashtra.”, he added.
Dr. M.H. Jawahirullah, President of Manithaneya Makkal Katchi (MKM), based in Chennai said, “No doubt that Mr Arun Jaitley was a cricket enthusiast and also the president of the association, but the decision to rename the Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium into Arun Jaitley stadium is not digestible. Feroz Shah kotla Tughlaq is credited with establishing the fortified city of Firozabad. Kotla literally means citadel or fort. Firozabad became the capital of the Delhi sultanate.
The agenda of the BJP and the Sangh parivar is to erase the memory of the Muslim rule. Muslim rulers are credited with creating many cities and towns uniting India and giving architectural heritage to the country.”
“To rename Feroz Shah Kotla Cricket stadium is an hidden agenda to erase the memory of erasing the history of Feroz Shah Kotla who has the unique of credit of creating our national capital Delhi. To commemorate Arun Jaitley they could have built a new stadium no one will object it. But this is done with a sinister motive of erasing the memory of the contribution of Muslim rulers. I appeal that this move to rename Feroz Shah Kotla should be taken back and a new stadium be built to honour Arun Jaitley.”Dr Jawahirullah concluded.
Even a counsellor based in Hyderabad, Sharifa Siddiqui, said, “This is all part of the agenda of safronising the nation. I don’t know if it is being done so much to honour Jaitley as much as to change an Islamic name”.