Adityanath to visit Agra, says it doesn’t matter who built Taj Mahal

Tribune News Service

Lucknow, October 17

A day after BJP MLA Sangeet’s Som controversial statement describing Taj Mahal as a blot on Indian culture built by traitors, Chief Minister Adityanath was in damage control mode on Tuesday.

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Adityanath, who sources said was displeased with Som’s remarks and reportedly called him to ask for an explanation, said on Tuesday: ““Yeh mahatva nahi rakhta ke kisney and kin karano se iska nirmal karaya. Yeh Bhartiye mazdooron ke khoon aur paseene se banaya gaya hai. Taj Mahal hamarey liye behad mahatwapurn hai. Khaastaur par tourism ke nazariye se yeh zyad mahatva rakhta hai. Wahan paryatakon ke liye suvidhayen aur suraksha muhaiya karane ki zimmedari hamari hai”. (It is not important who built the Taj Mahal, why it was built. It was built by the hard work and sweat of Indian labourers. Taj Mahal is very important for us, especially from the tourism point of view. Providing tourist facilities and ensuring their security is my responsibility).

He said historic monument was a significant tourist attraction and also announced he would visit Agra on October 26.

Distancing the Uttar Pradesh government from Som’s statement on Monday, Tourism Minister Rita Bahuguna Joshi described it as Som’s “individual opinion”, and said the Taj was her had already sanctioned Rs 155 crore for development of parks and various facilities in and around the Taj.

According to principal secretary tourism and information Avanish Awasthi, the chief minister is scheduled to visit Taj Mahal and Agra fort and review tourism and other schemes for Agra’s development on October 26.

Reacting to Som’s statement earlier in the day, All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul Muslimeen (AIMIM) Parliamentarian Asaduddin Owaisi said the same “traitors” — a word Som used in his speech — had also built Red Fort where Prime Minister Narendra Modi hoisted the Tiranga (tricolour) on Independence Day.

In a series of tweets Owaisi had asked “Can Modi and Yogi tell domestic and foreign tourist not to visit Taj Mahal?

’“Even Hyderabad House in Delhi was built by ‘traitor’ will Modi stop hosting foreign dignitaries?”

Similarly, Samajwadi party leader Mohd Azam Khan had also mockingly asked the state government to demolish the Taj as well as the parliament and Rashtrapati Bhawan, because they were all built by imperialist rulers.

Speaking at a public meeting in Sisauli village in Meerut Sangeet Som had questioned Taj Mahal’s place in Indian history and called it a blot on Indian culture.

According to Som, the person who built the Taj Mahal had “imprisoned his father” — a misplaced reference in which he conflated two Mughal rulers, Jahangir and Shah Jahan — and had targeted the Hindus of Uttar Pradesh and India. He had declared that it would be unfortunate if such people still found a place in history, and said that the incumbent state government was correcting “a historical wrong” by removing the ‘kalank katha’ (sullied stories) of Akbar, Babar and Aurangzeb from school textbooks.