Mumbai, July 24: After the Elphinstone railway station, one of the prominent stations on the Western line was renamed as Prabhadevi recently, demands to rename other railway stations of Mumbai are also increasing. According to a news report in the Times of India, the Shanmukhananda Sabha, one of the renowned temple trust in Mumbai, has suggested renaming Kings Circle Railway Station as Shanmukha Rail Nilayam. Besides this, another temple trust has also been pressing for renaming Matunga as Marubai after the gaondevi(village goddess).

The report further mentions that the temple authority has written a letter to the railway minister with the same demand. The trust's president V Shankar was quoted in the report as saying, "Our demand conforms with the BJP government policy to replace British names of locations and landmarks with Indian ones.  Shanmukhananda Sabha is a 66 years old institution that has been serving Mumbai through classical music. Along with renaming proposal, we have also offered to turn the railway station into India's first theme-based railway station. We will install music kiosks that give the feel of a live concert, craft musical murals and tableaux depicting various Indian instruments."

The constituency MP Rahul Shewale from Shiv Sena, on the contrary, has demanded renaming Kings Circle railway station as Parshwa Dham due to the vast population of Jain community residing there. The Shanmukhananda association ridiculed the demand and stated the area is dominated by the South Indian community; so their demand should be given priority. MP Shewale, over his demand to name the station as Parshwa Dham, was quoted as saying,"For two years, I have been receiving presentations from the Jain community to name Kings Circle station after the first Tirthankar, Parshvanath. There are many Jain colonies in King's Circle-Sion and the maximum number of derasars(Jain temple)are located here. I did not receive any demand from the Shanmukhananda. So I took only the Jain appeal to the parliament."

Similarly, the Marubai temple trust also wants to rename Matunga railway station after its deity. They have been quoted as saying, "The place where the temple has been built originally belonged to the temple. The Britishers took the place for developmental work. We seek to rename the station for the benefits of Mumbaikars."

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jul 24, 2018 03:20 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).