The court upheld renaming cities under the Maharashtra Land Revenue Code, affirming that such actions were procedurally valid and not justiciable based on subjective historical claims.

JUDGMENT

Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya, CJ. -

(A) PRELUDE :

1. The following quote from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet resonated throughout the hearing of this batch of writ petitions:

'What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet.'

In these lines Juliet makes a profound observation about the nature of names and says that a name does not make something that it is; even if rose had a different name other than 'rose', the essence of the flower would not change, it would still be the same. However, the Petitioners disagree with what Shakespeare says through Juliet in his famous tragedy.

(B) CHALLENGE:

2. By instituting these petitions under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, some of which are Public Interest Litigation Petitions, the Petitioners assail the validity of Notifications issued by the Government of Maharashtra changing the name of Aurangabad and Osmanabad cities to Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar and Dharashiv, respectively. Challenge in these petitions has also been made to the Notifications issued by the State Government changing the names of revenue areas or units i.e. revenue Division, District, Sub Division, Taluka and Village from Aurangabad revenue areas to Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar revenue areas and from Osmanabad revenue areas to Dharashiv revenue areas. The impugned Notification bearing No. Ganab-2715/Mantri 18/C.R.218/29 dated 24th February 2023, whereby the name of Aurangabad city has been changed to Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar city, is extracted hereinbelow:

'GENERAL ADMINISTRATION DEPARTMENT

Hutatma Rajguru Chowk, Madam Cama Marg, Mantralaya,

Mumbai 400 032, dated the 24th February 2023.

NOTIFICATION

No. Ganab-2715/Mantri 18/C.R.218/29.-The Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India vide its letter No.11/19/2022-M&G, dated 24th February, 2023, has approved the proposal of the Government of Maharashtra, for changing the name of City 'Aurangabad' to 'Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar'. The Government of Maharashtra is hereby pleased to direct that the name of the City 'Aurangabad', Taluka & District-Aurangabad, Maharashtra State shall be changed as 'Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar" (Nr itux), Taluka & District-Aurangabad, Maharashtra State.

2. The necessary changes shall be carried out in the Government records of the State by all concerned as shown in the following TABLE :

TABLE



By order and in the name of the Governor of Maharashtra,

PRAKASH INDALKAR,

Deputy Secretary to Government of Maharashtra.'

The Notification bearing No.Ganab-4721/CR-73/A-29 dated 24th February 2023 changing the name of Osmanabad city to Dharashiv city is also extracted hereinbelow:

'GENERAL ADMINISTRATION DEPARTMENT

Hutatma Rajguru Chowk, Madam Cama Marg,

Mantralaya, Mumbai 400 032, dated the 24th February 2023.

NOTIFICATION

No. Ganab-4721/CR-73/A/29.-The Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India vide its letter No.11/18/2022-M&G, dated 7th February, 2023, has approved the proposal of the Government of Maharashtra, for changing the name of City 'Osmanabad' to 'Dharashiv'. The Government of Maharashtra is hereby pleased to direct that the name of the City 'Osmanabad', Taluka & District Osmanabad, Maharashtra State shall be changed as 'Dharashiv' (mifr), Taluka & District Osmanabad, Maharashtra State.

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