Rampur: Uttar Pradesh minority welfare minister Baldev Singh Aulakh on Friday lashed out at Samajwadi leader Azam Khan for saying the Taj Mahal will be "destroyed" and accused him of making such statements to create tension between two communities.

The minister said Samajwadi patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav and party chief Akhilesh Yadav should clarify why Khan made such remarks. "On what basis has Khan very confidently stated that the Taj Mahal will be blown up when chief minister Yogi Adityanath has emphatically termed the Taj a national monument our pride and heritage?" Aulakh asked.

Khan should present evidence if he claimed a conspiracy was being hatched to "destroy" the Taj, Aulakh said and alleged such remarks were aimed at creating tensions between two communities to regain power.

Khan had in a comment attributed to him said on October 18 that "it is almost definite that the Taj Mahal will be destroyed because whatever (historian) P.N. Oak wrote in his book, all of that is being implemented by the fascist forces of India and the RSS". According to Khan, Oak had written "there stood a Shiva temple in Ayodhya". "If the Babri Masjid could be destroyed because people believe there stood a temple instead, then no place of worship in India is safe."

BJP Rajya Sabha MP Vinay Katiyar had said earlier this week that the Taj was "a Shiv temple" and "the Shivalinga was replaced with the mazar (mausoleum to)". Before that, BJP MLA Sangeet Som had said "those who got the Taj built had tried to finish Hindu culture". Later, chief minister Yogi Adityanath said it was not important who got the Taj constructed but credit should go to the "Hindustani labourers" who had shed sweat and blood to build the monument to love.

On Friday, Haryana minister Anil Vij fuelled the controversy by describing the Taj as a "beautiful graveyard". " Taj Mahal ek khoobsurat kabristan hai," the controversial BJP leader, who had once described Narendra Modi as a "better brand name" than Mahatma Gandhi, tweeted.

Khan, a former Uttar Pradesh minister, had said "the kind of atmosphere that was there before the Babri Masjid was demolished was created long before the actual event took place". "There was a high court and a Supreme Court stay and then chief minister (the BJP's Kalyan Singh) had submitted an affidavit to the court. Despite all this, Babri Masjid was demolished with dynamite." PTI