Hisar to Agrodaka? No support for name-change

Tribune News Service

Deepender Deswal

Hisar, March 14

Hisar BJP MLA who was the Urban Local Bodies Minister in the Manohar Lal Khattar’s government stirred a controversy by raising the demand of changing the name of Hisar to Agrodaka.

A wasteful exercise

Most of the residents rejected the proposal of changing the name of the town describing it a wasteful exercise. “Hisar has its own historical roots and identity,” said resident Ashok Singh.

Fort of Firoz

The fortress township of Hisar was founded in 1354 as a makeshift centre of power by Delhi Sultan Firoz Shah Tughlaq. ‘Hisar-e-Firoza’ literally meaning ‘fort of Firoz’, which has 665-year-old history. Firoz Shah Tughlaq stayed in Hisar for around five years (1356-1361) and thus the town became the centre of Delhi Sultanate. —Dr Mahender Singh, Historian

Dr Gupta had argued that ‘Hisar-E-Firoza’ name was given by the head of the Delhi Sultanate, Firoz Shah Tuglaq, in 1354 and it was an Arabic word. He made these remarks during the launch of a survey for the exploration of the ancient site in Agroha village of the district on Monday.

Dr Gupta claimed that in the Arabic language, the word Hisar meant fort (quila) and so it was Firoz Shah’s fort. “Why do we need to keep the name? Agroha was the capital city of Maharaja Agrasen who participated in the Mahabharata war about 5,000 years ago. Agrodaka-now known as Agroha was the capital city and Hisar was part of it,” he claimed.

However, historian Dr Mahender Singh said both Hisar and Agroha had different historical identities as both places had their own separate unique ancient past.

“The fortress township of Hisar was founded in 1354 as a makeshift centre of power by Delhi Sultan Firoz Shah Tughlaq. ‘Hisar-e-Firoza’ literally meaning ‘fort of Firoz’, which has 665-year-old history,” Singh said.

He said Firoz Shah Tughlaq stayed in Hisar for around five years (1356-1361) and thus the town became the centre of Delhi Sultanate. Dr Singh said Agroha had a history, which was about 1,000 to 2,700 years old. The Agroha mounds had been excavated three times up to about 39 ft. “The upper layer of the excavation indicated that it was a fort constructed by the Rajputs or Sikhs about 1,000 years ago. The second layer indicated that it was a capital city of Yaudheya or Agras, which had a historical period of 1700-2300 years. The third layer of the excavation had evidence of Buddhism, which could be about 2,700 years old. The excavation studies indicated that it was a centre of trade during the Buddha period,” he said .

Dr Singh said the Agroha site was excavated by CJ Rodgers in 1888-89 and re-excavated by

HL Srivastava of the Archaeological Survey of India in 1938-39 to a depth of about 3.65 m. The site was further excavated by PK Sharan and JS Khatri of the Department of Archaeology and Museums, Haryana Government, in 1978-84.

Most of the residents rejected the proposal of changing the name of the town describing it a wasteful exercise. “Hisar has its own historical roots and identity,” said resident Ashok Singh. Another resident Trilok Bansal took a dig at the former ULB Minister, stating that the person who floated the proposal to change the name, was found missing in the new BJP-led Haryana Cabinet Notably, Dr Gupta was not retained by the BJP government in the fresh reshuffle, which is now headed by Nayab Singh Saini.

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