The Bombay High Court on Wednesday dismissed a series of petitions challenging the Maharashtra government’s move to rename Aurangabad district as Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar and Osmanabad as Dharashiv, reports Bar and Bench.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya and Justice Arif Doctor said that the notification issued by the state government was not illegal.
“We have no hesitation to hold that the notifications renaming cities and revenue divisions does not suffer from any vice,” the Court said, as quoted by Bar and Bench.
The petitions are devoid of merits and hence stand dismissed, the high court said.
The Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government led by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray had decided to change the names of the two cities. The decision was taken at a Cabinet meeting held on June 29, 2021.
In 2022, the Maharashtra cabinet, led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, approved the renaming of Aurangabad to Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar and Osmanabad to Dharashiv. A Government Resolution was passed on July 16, 2022, by the two-member cabinet to change the names, subsequently forwarded to the central government.
In February 2023, the Union Home Ministry provided a no-objection letter for the name changes, followed by a gazette notification issued by the state government altering the names of Aurangabad and Osmanabad.
Numerous petitions were filed by residents of Aurangabad opposing the government’s decision to rename the city as Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar.
Additionally, a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) was submitted by 17 Osmanabad residents against the renaming of their city to Dharashiv.
The plea against renaming Osmanabad said that the renaming could incite religious and communal hatred, and could lead to dicord between two religious groups, which stands in contradiction with India’s secular fabric. It also pointed out that Maharashtra government in 1988 attempted to change the name of Osmanabad to Dharashiv, but they failed.
Both petitions characterized the government’s actions as “politically motivated.”
The Maharashtra government countered the pleas, saying that the name changes were based on historical significance rather than political motivations.