Although Adhikari did not specify which Suhrawardy he was talking about in his post, it appeared to referred to Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, a Muslim League leader who was the Prime Minister of Bengal during the 1946 riots and later went on to become the Prime Minister of Pakistan.

However, historically, the road was never named after the controversial political leader, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy.

Instead, it was named after his uncle, Hassan Shaheed Suhrawardy – a highly regarded Bengali academic, diplomat, and art critic.

The public discourse surrounding Suhrawardy Avenue, which connects the Park Circus 7-Point Crossing to Don Bosco Circle, has frequently faced scrutiny and debate.

Nearly a decade ago, a wave of social media outrage erupted when an online right-wing outlet published a fiery piece titled, “It’s A Crying Shame That ‘The Butcher of Bengal’ has a road named after him in Kolkata. The article argued that the city shouldn’t be honouring Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, the political figure heavily blamed for enabling mass atrocities, violence, and displacement of the city’s Hindu population during the mid-1940s.

The Calcutta Municipal Gazette of March 1933 mentions that the Calcutta Municipal Corporation held a meeting on March 8, 1933 and decided to name Suhrawardy Avenue “the new (100 ft) road constructed by the C.I.T. (Calcutta Improvement Trust) from Park Circus to the junction of Kasaipara Lane (and lying north of the Park) on which stands the house of Sir Hassan Suhrawardy, Vice-Chancellor of the Calcutta University”. The name of the road was notified through the Calcutta Municipal Gazette on April 20, 1933.

The street’s new name is after Gopal Chandra Mukherjee, also known as “Gopal Patha”, associated with the “Great Calcutta Killings” that began on August 16, 1946, following the call for “Direct Action Day” by the All-India Muslim League, led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

Mukherjee, then a 33-year-old meat shop owner from College Street, mobilised local youths into an armed resistance unit later called the Bharater Jatiya Bahini (Indian National Force), and gained prominence for organising community defense measures during the peak of the riots.

“By renaming it (Suhrawardy Avenue) after Gopal Mukherjee, the fearless soul who stepped up as a protector-in-chief to defend and save thousands of innocent lives, finally, the restoration of historical justice will be achieved by honouring a true guardian and saviour. It’s time West Bengal remembers, corrects, and honours the Real Heroes,” Adhikari wrote on Sunday.

However, Opposition leaders slammed the move, saying that the BJP government was “overlooking historical facts”.

Congress leader Pawan Khera said the BJP leaders confused Hassan Suhrawardy with Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy. “These BJP leaders do not even know the difference between Hasan Suhrawardy and Huseyn Suhrawardy. Such is their ignorance,” he said in a social media post.

Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said Hassan Suhrawardy had served as vice-chancellor of the University of Calcutta and was succeeded by Syama Prasad Mookerjee, arguing that the historical record was clear.

TMC MP Mahua Moitra, in a social media post, said, “Suhrawardy Avenue was named after Hassan Suhrawardy, Vice Chancellor of Calcutta University before Shyamaprasad Mookerjee. What cheap political points is the BJP trying to score? And Bengalis are buying this?.

The CPI(M) said the renaming was based on a “historically incorrect narrative” that the avenue had been named after Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy.