Lucknow: Samajwadi Party leader and former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav on Monday took a quips at Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath for not visiting the eidgah in Lucknow on the occasion of Eid.
Former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav said It has been a regular feature of chief ministers in Uttar Pradesh to visit an eidgah on the occasion of Eid.
“I am an ousted chief minister…I am here. When he (Yogi) has not come he should tell,” Akhilesh told reporters.
The Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Monday broke with a 43-year old tradition when he failed to turn up at the Eidgah to join the congregation in prayers on Eid-ul-Fitr.
Earlier BJP Governments had maintained the tradition and chief ministers like Rajnath Singh and Kalyan Singh made it a point to turn up at the Eidgah in Lucknow to wish people on Eid. But Yogi Adityanath, who is also the Mahanth of Gorakhnath temple, is clearly worried that his standing as a spiritual and temporal leader of the Hindus would suffer. Hence his decision to skip the function.
The tradition of CMs turning up at the Eidgah in Lucknow was started by Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna in 1974. Since then all the CMs have visited the Eidgah, confirm sources within the state government.
The Uttar Pradesh Governor Ram Naik, Deputy Chief Minister Dinesh Sharma and former Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, however, did turn up at the Eidgah and wished people ‘Eid Mubarak’ but the chief minister, who had earlier done away with Iftar, was conspicuous by his absence.
