LUCKNOW: After she took on her own government alleging that reservation provisions meant for Dalits were under threat, BJP's Bahraich MP Savitri Bai Phule criticised the Yogi Adityanath government on Monday for changing the names of Mughalsarai and Allahabad, saying the move would hurt the Muslim sentiment.While Mughalsarai was renamed after RSS ideologue Deen Dayal Upadhyay, the government is said to be considering changing the name of Allahabad to Prayag ahead of next year's Kumbh. Muslims were part of the 'Bahujan Samaj' and enjoyed voting rights like any other citizen of India, Phule told TOI. Reacting to PM Narendra Modi’s recent Azamgarh rally where he asked Congress whether it was a party of Muslim men, she said political discourse should not be constructed along religious lines.“Our honourable PM has been repeatedly saying his government is working on ‘Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas’... therefore, politics on religious lines is not acceptable. I am not just an MP but also a social worker. We should speak about humanity and not just politics. I demand the state government to reconsider its decision of changing the names of the cities,” she said.Similar attempts are being made to change the name of Lucknow to Lakshampuri, Phule said. “Lucknow was named after Lakhan Pasi, a Dalit leader. But now I am learning about attempts to name it after Lakshman. This is nothing short of insult to the great Dalit leader,” she said.Phule, who was formerly with BSP, had raised a banner of revolt against BJP in April this year by organising a massive rally in Lucknow to protest against “anti-Dalit policies” of the Modi government. She had dared her own government at the Centre, saying Dalits won’t beg for reservation since it was their constitutional right.

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