Lucknow: Teele Wali mosque/ Laxman Teela
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A backgrounder
Right wingers have long believed that the mosque came up on what they call ‘Lakshman Teela.’ Late Lalji Tandon’s book further cemented this belief. There have also been demands to install a Lakshman statue in front of the Tile Wali Masjid.
LUCKNOW: The ‘mosque-over-temple’ claim challenging the existence of ‘Tile Wali Masjid’ is not new, nor is the BJP leaders’ and right-wing activists’ demand to rename Lucknow to Lakshmanpur, as they strongly believe that the erstwhile city of nawabs was established by Lord Ram’s brother Lakshman.
The ‘perennial’ belief was further fuelled in 2018 when BJP veteran Lalji Tandon’s book—‘Ankaha Lucknow’ or ‘Untold Lucknow’ got published. The book further fomented the controversy over its claim that Lucknow’s biggest Sunni mosque – the ‘Teele Wali Masjid’ was built by Mughal emperor Aurangzeb over the ‘Lakshman Teela’ – a raised platform believed to be christened after Lord Ram’s brother Lakshman.
The book also said that the city was originally named Lakshmanavati, then Lakshmanpur and then Lakhnavati, before it finally became Lucknow. The book claimed about the existence of a ‘Shesh Gufa’ on the Lakshman Teela - proof of Lucknow’s link with Lakshman. The ‘Gufa’, Tandon’s book claims, was demolished during Alauddin Khilji’s reign while the mosque came up over the ‘Teela’ during Mughal emperor Aurangzeb’s tenure.
The same year, there was also a demand regarding installation of a Lakshman statue in front of the Tile Wali Masjid and a proposal was submitted to the Lucknow Municipal Corporation by BJP corporators. Now, with the Kashi- Mathura issues under the spotlight, the Tile Wali Masjid too has attracted attention once more, with right wingers seeking its survey, accusing the mosque administration of destroying evidence related to Hindu religion present there.
“It’s a known fact that Lucknow was named after Lakshman and the mound on which the Tile Wali Masjid is presently located, used to be known as Lakshman Tila. There used to be a grand temple. I am sure the experts will find the remains of the temples if an excavation drive is carried out on the mound,” says Amit Puri, a senior BJP leader.
The ‘mosque over temple’ claim was dismissed by Maulana Wasif Hasan, co-mutwalli Tile Wali Masjid, who said that the claims were less historically and most politically driven. However, he agreed to the fact that the mosque came up during Aurangzeb’s regime.
Recently, the ‘perennial issue’ to rename Lucknow to Lakshmanpur gained momentum again when chief minister Yogi Adityanath, while welcoming Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his visit to Lucknow, tweeted: ‘Sheshavatar Bhagwan Lakshman ki pawan nagri Lucknow mein aapka swagat aur abhinandan’. Interestingly, the tweet also kicked off the speculations that Yogi Government, known for renaming, was set to re-name Lucknow.
So far, the Yogi government has re-christened Faizabad Railway Station as Ayodhya Cantt and Mughalsarai Junction as Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyay Junction. Also, it changed the name of Allahabad to Prayagraj and hinted at the possibilities of changing the names of Sultanpur, Mirzapur, Aligarh, Firozabad and Mainpuri.
Besides, the saffron brigade has also demanded to re-christen Agra as Agravan, Muzaffarnagar as Luxmi Nagar, Miyanganj (a town in Unnao district) as Mayaganj, Aligarh as Harigarh and Mainpuri as Maya Puri.
