New Delhi [India], April 1 (ANI): Bharatiya Janata Party MP Naresh Bansal on Tuesday lauded Uttarakhand government's decision to rename villages in Haridwar, Dehradun, Nainital, and Udham Singh Nagar districts of the state, saying that Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami is 'continuously working for the development of the state' and is 'taking tough decisions.'

He further praised other decisions of the state government, including the implementation of the Uniform Civil Code (UCC).

'Uttarakhand CM Pushkar Singh Dhami is continuously working for the development of the state and is taking tough decisions for this, like the anti-cheating law, which resulted in 25,000 youths getting jobs, and just like that, the state became the first to implement UCC...We also had the top ranking in 7 parameters for Sustainable Development Goals of NITI Aayog, this is a government of decisions,' the BJP MP told ANI.

Likening the decision of name change an effort to 'get out of the mindset of slavery,' he added, 'So this is also one of the decisions in that line, that some places and names which used to insult us, and in an effort to get out of the mind-set of slavery...this is a good decision, I congratulate CM Pushkar Singh Dhami and his cabinet.'

On Monday, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Dhami announced the renaming of certain places in Haridwar, Dehradun, Nainital, and Udham Singh Nagar districts of the state.

Earlier today, Locals in Haridwar district celebrated the decision to change the name of Gajiwali village to Arya Nagar, saying that they had been wanting to change the names for a long time.

'The atmosphere is like Diwali or Holi. This was the demand of the villagers for a long time and long ago, we had made a proposal to former minister (Yatishwaranand) Swami too,' said a villager, Devendra Singh Negi, to ANI.

'He took a big initiative and reached out to (Pushkar Singh) Dhami. Dhami ji has done the work of changing the name of the village. We celebrated with dhols (drums), distributing sweets, people have taken an off to celebrate,' he added.

Another villager, Subodh Kumar Gupta, talking about the change of Gajiwali to Aryanagar told ANI, 'I would first like to thank CM Dhami on behalf of all villagers, and this is an initiative for development, the future generations of our children would benefit from this. We used to say that people did not know about us because of the name Gajiwali, and now people will know.'

This initiative aims to inspire people by honouring great personalities who have contributed to the preservation of Indian culture, according to an official statement.

In Haridwar district, Aurangzebpur will be called Shivaji Nagar, Gajiwali will change to Arya Nagar, Chandpur to Jyotiba Phule Nagar, Mohammadpur Jat to Mohanpur Jat, Khanpur Kursli to Ambedkar Nagar, Indrishpur to Nandpur, Khanpur to Shri Krishna Pur, and Akbarpur Fazalpur to Vijayanagar, as per CM Dhami's announcement. (ANI)