Rajya Sabha disrupted over renaming of railway station

The Rajya Sabha on Friday was briefly adjourned when some opposition members objected to the proposal of renaming Uttar Pradesh's Mughalsarai railway station in Uttar Pradesh and came near the chair's podium.

Samajwadi Party member Naresh Agrawal raised the issue during the Zero Hour and demanded to know why the government was changing the name of the "historic" Mughalsarai station.

"They are going to change New Delhi's name too," he said.

The Central government has recently okayed the proposal by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to rename the station after Jan Sangh ideologue Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyay, who was found dead at the station in mysterious circumstances in 1968.

Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi retaliated that liking a railway station's name after the Mughals and not after Upadhyay was "not the right thinking".

"Will all the things be named only after Nehru-Gandhis' names? A lot of other people have given sacrifice for this country," he said.

Meanwhile, other Samajwadi Party MPs and BSP members too came near the Chair's podium and loudly protested against the proposed change of name.

Deputy Chairman P.J. Kurien, who was presiding over the House, said that such a matter cannot be raised during the Zero Hour or under Rule 267. But the agitating MPs kept loudly protesting.

Amid the ruckus, Kurien adjourned the House for 10 minutes.

The Mughalsarai station was set up in 1862 when the East India Company linked Howrah and Delhi by rail.

--IANS

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