Madhya Pradesh government renames Hoshangabad district as Narmadapura

Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Friday evening announced that the Hoshangabad district will be renamed Narmadapuram. During an event organised to observe Narmada Jayanti in Hoshangabad, chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan told the people that the name of Hoshangabad district would be changed and the district would henceforth be known as Narmadapuram. “I have been trying to change the name since 2008 but the then Congress-led central government didn’t approve the proposal of changing the name. Now, the Central government will surely approve the proposal,” Shivraj Singh Chouhan said.

The Hoshangabad town, the headquarter of Hoshangabad district, is already also known as Narmadapuram among the locals. This is because the district lies in the valley of the Narmada river, with the town located on the south bank of the river.

Recently, BLP MLA and pro-tem speaker Rameshwar Sharma had said, “Any place shouldn’t be named after a destroyer.”

The name Hoshangabad came from Hoshang Shah, the first formally appointed Sultan of the Malwa Sultanate of Central India. Like several other Muslim rulers in India, Hoshang Shah had also destroyed temples and constructed mosques in their places.