A proposal to launch the campaign to change Ahmedabad’s name to “Karnavati” was passed during a district-level students’ convention organised by the ABVP here on February 8. “The proposal was passed by 5,000 students at a “chhatra sammelan” (students’ convention) organised here to rename Ahmedabad as Karnavati. “We will submit a memorandum to the mamlatdar (revenue officer), collector, principals of colleges, and wherever we feel required to press for our demand,” ABVP’s Gujarat secretary Yuti Gajre told reporters. The move comes nearly five years after the then-Gujarat deputy chief minister Nitin Patel said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Government was willing to change Ahmedabad’s name to “Karnavati” if it got past the legal hurdles and received the required support.
Meanwhile, Congress claimed the issue of renaming Ahmedabad was being brought up by the right-wing student organisation as propaganda to distract the attention of youth from the more pressing issue of question paper leaks, which recently led to the cancellation of the panchayat junior clerk exam. Youth Congress spokesperson Kapil Desai said such “propaganda” was meant to distract the attention of students and youth from more relevant issues affecting them. “The BJP is in power at every level, and if the ABVP is really serious about renaming Ahmedabad, then it would get it done without any difficulty, like Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath does every now and then,” Desai said. He claimed that the ABVP is not really serious about it and intends to use such a “gimmick” to distract the attention of youth from the more pressing issues plaguing them.
The proposal has also drawn flak from the Asaduddin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM), with its state leader Danish Qureshi targeting the ruling BJP over the issue. “There are many issues in the BJP’s magic box that are not relevant but take the country and its people towards anarchy. They (BJP leaders) talk about the Uniform Civil Code, population control, and keep such non-relevant issues alive to hide their own failures,” Qureshi claimed while talking to PTI. “Changing a name does not change anything but works to dilute the issues by creating an anarchic situation. I believe the BJP should emerge from this, and people should understand this as it causes a lot of harm,” he said.
In 2017, Ahmedabad was declared a World Heritage City by UNESCO, becoming the country’s first city to hold the distinction. Historically, the area around Ahmedabad has been inhabited since the 11th century, when it was known as Ashaval. The Chalukya ruler Karna of Anhilwara (modern Patan) had waged a successful war against the Bhil king of Ashaval and established a city called Karnavati on the banks of the Sabarmati river.
Sultan Ahmed Shah laid the foundation of a new walled city near Karnavati in 1411 AD and named it Ahmedabad. As a matter of fact, Veer Savarkar wanted that the name of Ahmedabad should be changed. On February 4, 1960, Veer Savarkar suggested that Ahmedabad be renamed Karnavati before the state of Gujarat was carved out of the Bombay Presidency. A Gujarat-based website that goes by the name Desh Gujarat has also published an article related to this demand of Veer Savarkar. Savarkar wanted that the Muslim invaders imposed their culture on the Indians. Now that the country is free, such symbols of slavery should be abolished. That’s why he had a different vision of his own regarding the naming of all the places. It is also mentioned in the riveting work by Uday Mahurkar and Chirayu Pandit, “Veer Savarkar: The Man Who Could Have Prevented Partition.” It is written in this book that Veer Savarkar wanted to change the names of those Indian cities and regions that were kept by mediaeval fundamentalist rulers to impose Islamic culture on Hindus. That’s why they wanted Ahmedabad, whose real name was Karnavati but was changed to Ahmedabad by Sultan Ahmed Shah.
