Uttar Pradesh’s controversial BJP chief-minister Yogi Adityanath is to visit the famed Taj Mahal on the banks of River Yamuna on 26th October, in what would be his first-ever visit to the world-renowned tourist site after taking over as chief-minister of the country’s most populous State in March this year. His visit assumes significance after Taj was recently ‘excluded’ from places of most-thronged tourist sites in the State.

BJP MLA Sangeet Som had recently said that Taj Mahal and many other structures in the country were ‘symbols of slavery’ as they had been constructed by the Moghuls who ruled the country with ‘iron hand’ for many centuries. “There is no need to preserve structures erected by those aggressors,” he had said.

Joining the issue albeit sarcastically, Samajwadi Party MLA Azam Khan said that going by Som’s version, structures such as Red Fort, Parliament Building, Qutub Minar and the Rashtrapati Bhawan in Delhi should also be demolished as they were also constructed by foreign aggressors.

Amid reports that Adiyanath had asked Som to explain his comments, it has now been intimated that the chief-minister would undertake a visit to the Taj Mahal on 26th October mainly as a trouble-shooting exercise and to foment harmony among communities, strengthened by the recent offer of the U.P. Shia Wakf Board’s to donate 10 silver arrows to the proposed erection of 100-meter tall Lord Ram statue at Sarayu.