On the southern bank of the Yamuna river in Agra, some 250 km from Delhi, stands one of the Seven Wonders of the World, the Taj Mahal. Almost 3 million people visit it every year, or 45,000 people a day during peak tourist season.

The 385-year-old monument commissioned by Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan in 1632, to treasure the remains of his dead wife, has become the focus of a contentious decision the BJP intends to take.

Addressing a gathering at Meerut on Sunday, Sangeet Som, the BJP MLA from Sardhana, declared that the Taj Mahal should not be considered part of Indian history. Earlier this month, the Uttar Pradesh government had also removed the Taj Mahal from the UP Tourism booklet.

The booklet, Apaar Sambhavnaye, or ‘Boundless Possibilities’, released by the UP Tourism Department displays a cover page of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Tourism Minister Rita Bahuguna Joshi at the Ganga Aarti in Varanasi. The inside pages highlight the religious significance of Varanasi, the Kumbh Mela, Ayodhya as Lord Ram’s birth place and Mathura-Vrindavan for its link to Lord Krishna. The Taj Mahal , declared a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1983, is missing in the brochure.

The BJP’s take

In his speech on Sunday, Som called Mughal emperors Babar, Akbar and Aurangzeb “traitors” and demanded their names be removed from history. Instead, he added the lives of “real great men” of India, like Maharana Pratap and Shivaji, will be taught as history to students. “Many people were pained to see that the Taj Mahal was removed from the list of places (tourist destinations). What type of history? Is this history that the person who built the Taj Mahal imprisoned his father? Do you call it a history when the one who built the Taj targeted many Hindus in Uttar Pradesh and Hindustan?” Som said.

On June 15, the UP Chief Minister Adityanath said the Taj Mahal and other such monuments “did not reflect Indian culture”.  He said foreign dignitaries were being gifted replicas of these monuments, which did not reflect the right Indian culture. “Now (read under the Narendra Modi government),” Adityanath pointed out, “foreign dignitaries are gifted copies of the Bhagavad Gita and the Ramayan when they come to India.”

In response to Sangeet Som’s hate speech, Minister Rita Bahuguna Joshi said the Taj Mahal is part of “our proud heritage” as well as a major tourist spot. “It might be his individual opinion, CM Yogi Adityanath and I call it part of our cultural heritage. It is heritage and it is a major tourist spot. We are committed to the uplift of Agra and Taj. From a tourist’s point of view, we are proud of the Taj Mahal,” said Joshi.

Standing by his statements, Sangeet Som told ANI, “I don’t oppose Taj Mahal. It’s a beautiful heritage. I oppose Mughals who built it and how they’ve been portrayed in history.” He added that the Mughals were not Indian but attackers who demolished temples. Som also accused the Congress of interpreting history in a twisted manner for vote-bank politics.

The opposition

All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi responded to Som by questioning if Red Fort was also going to be dropped from Indian history. “The Red Fort was built by the same group of traitors. Will PM Narendra Modi stop hoisting the flag from there? Can Modi and Yogi ask domestic, foreign tourists to not visit the Taj?” said Owaisi.

Upon learning of the omission of the Taj Mahal from the UP Tourism booklet, the Congress had called it both a “joke and a tragedy”.

Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi told Business Standard, “If it is a booklet on tourism and it excludes Taj Mahal, at one level, it is a joke and, at another level, it is tragic. It is like saying we will have (William Shakespeare’s) ‘Hamlet’ without the Prince of Denmark. How can you imagine tourism in Uttar Pradesh or India without Taj Mahal? I cannot understand. If it is indeed a booklet on tourism and excludes the Taj, it shows a clear religious bias which is completely misplaced,” he said. Singhvi said “such pettiness diminishes” India.

What the historian says

Uma Chakravarti, historian, feminist and author, believes the BJP decides to make such statements simply because they cannot target Muslims directly all the time. The idea is to ensure that passive aggressive attempt co-exist with direct violence against Muslims to complete the national project to convert India into a Hindu nation.

“While gau rakshaks attack them (Muslims) on a daily basis, it is also very important for the BJP to delegitimise Muslims in history as well. Since history is so important to us, it is equally important to cast them guilty through a historical perspective. This is a political strategy to target Muslims,” she said.

She also believes that such attempts only reinforce the fact that the BJP simply mirrors Pakistan in its political strategies. Pakistan works with the rational that the pre-Muslim era doesn’t exist. This is exactly what the BJP is doing to Muslims in India.

Chakravarti pointed out the BJP’s attempt to make Muslim conquerors like Babar, Akbar and Aurangzeb look like savages, looters and rapists who plundered a Hindu nation. “The raping, looting and killing was not specific to Muslim conquerors. That was the nature of the practise of monarchy. Every ruler, of every religion was guilty of what the BJP is solely accusing the Muslims of. That is the way power was exercised at that point. It is not exclusive to Muslim conquerors,” she said.

According to Chakravarti, it would be “crazy to simply reduce our history into one stream” because India exists and thrives on its multiple histories. “Even as the right wing tries to make it seem like they’re so concerned with historical knowledge, it is evident that they’re not. They’re simply interested in creating mythology that suits their strategy,” Chakravarti said.