The Allahabad High court has dismissed a plea to change its name to the Pryagraj High Court or the Uttar Pradesh High Court.
A Lucknow bench of the high court has rejected the lawsuit, filed in the form of a Public Interest Litigation, terming it as a “publicity stunt litigation.”
The petition filed by advocate Ashok Pandey was dismissed by a bench of justices P.K Jaiswal and D.K Singh.
The plea filed by the petitioner sought to rename the high court on the basis that the state government rechristened Allahabad district as Pryagraj on October 16, 2018. In its order, the bench stated that renaming its name is within the power of the Legislature under the Constitutional scheme, and hence it cannot interfere in the issue.
The high court, however, did not impose any cost on the petitioner for filing “unnecessary” petition, saying the petitioner was a practising lawyer of the court.
The Yogi-led government of Uttar Pradesh has always been in limelight for its policy of name changing of the cities and historical monuments in the state. Along with changing the name of Allahabad city to Pryagraj and Mughal Sarai railway junction to Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyaya earlier, recently it has also changed the name of a museum in Agra from ‘Mughal Museum’ to ‘Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Museum’.
