Union minister Giriraj Singh has stirred a new controversy as he demanded that Muzaffarnagar be renamed.
Stating that Muzaffarnagar has been the capital of farmers and its name was hurting its pride, Singh said there was a need for a new name for the district to erase the signs of Mughals after over seven decades of the country’s independence.
Singh was addressing a gathering of cattle farmers at an animal and agriculture fair in Muzaffarnagar on Friday.
Reacting on the minister’s demand, Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) district president Yogesh Sharma said the statement was nothing but a political stunt. “The general elections are around, and they raise such issues to polarise people,” he said.
Muzaffarnagar has been the centerstage for farmers’ politics as it is where BKU’s headquarters is located. The district was rocked by riots in 2013 that claimed many lives and rendered over 50,000 people homeless. The riots affected the social and political equations in the area, which are said to have helped the BJP in getting a landslide victory in the 2014 elections.
BKU president Naresh Tikait also visited the fair.
Singh, meanwhile, also urged youngsters to adopt the latest technologies in farming so that they could earn ₹2 lakh from each acre of their lands.