Local Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Parliament Rakesh Singh on Monday sought the renaming of the more than 150-year-old Jabalpur railway station after Rani Durgavati, a revered tribal queen of the erstwhile Gondwana kingdom. Singh, whose move is being seen as an attempt to woo tribals ahead of the year-end Assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh, said he has held talks with senior Railway officials over the renaming issue and will study the entire procedure before submitting a formal proposal to authorities.
In 2021, the Habibganj railway station in the state capital Bhopal was renamed after Rani Kamlapati. A much-respected figure for the tribal Gond community, Rani Kamlapati was the last Hindu queen of the Bhopal region.
The Jabalpur revenue division, having eight districts, has several tribal-reserved seats, where the Congress had put up a good show in the 2018 Assembly polls.“I had a talk with top officials of the West Central Railway over renaming Jabalpur station after Rani Durgavati,” Singh said.
The Member of Parliament, who is also the BJP chief whip in the Lok Sabha, was talking to reporters after holding talks with the WCR General Manager and Jabalpur Railway Divisional Manager.“Rani Durgavati was our ancestor. We should feel proud and privileged to be a part of the place where Rani Durgavati lived. Her governance and water management and heroism had been unique. Keeping in mind the sentiments of the people of Jabalpur… Jabalpur station should be renamed after her," he said.
But this (renaming) is a long-drawn exercise as a proposal from the state government goes to different ministries before a decision is taken and approved by the Centre, said the parliamentarian from Jabalpur. When contacted, Singh told PTI, "I am going to study the procedure involved in renaming railway stations before taking a call on sending a proposal to the state government."The BJP leader also said another proposal is going to be finalized to remodel and redesign the Railway station with a Rs 300 crore investment.
Rani Durgavati attained martyrdom on June 24, 1564, while fighting the Mughals near Narai Nala in Jabalpur district.
The Jabalpur (then known as Jubbulpore) station was opened for rail traffic in 1867 connecting Bombay (now Mumbai) and Calcutta (now Kolkata). At that time, it was the interchange station between the Great Indian Peninsula Railway and East Indian Railway. The ruling BJP is making desperate attempts to win back tribals who wield considerable influence in several Assembly seats.
In 2018, the saffron party lost the MP Assembly elections to the Congress by a slender margin. The Congress had then-won 31 tribal-reserved seats, while the BJP had to content with just 16 such constituencies. After losing the polls under the leadership of Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the BJP sat in Opposition for 15 months before returning to power after a rebellion by now Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia against the Congress leadership. The saffron party stormed to power in MP by unseating the Congress in the 2003 Assembly polls and its performance was boosted by a stellar show in Adivasi-reserved seats where it won 37 out of the 41 constituencies earmarked for candidates from Scheduled Tribes then.
The BJP bagged 31 out of the 47 ST-reserved seats in 2008 and retained power. The number of tribal-reserved seats in the state went up to 41 from 47 due to the delimitation exercise. In 2013, the saffron party repeated its 2008 performance in the ST-reserved Assembly seats. According to the Schedule Tribe Population Census of 2011, the population of indigenous people was more than 1.53 crore and accounted for 21.08 percent of the total 7.26 crore inhabitants of Madhya Pradesh. Around 1.75 crore tribals, accounting for 22 percent of the population in MP now, hold the key to power with 47 of the total 230 Assembly seats reserved for them. More than 50,000 tribal voters are present in 35 other Assembly seats in the state, political observers said.
