The notice is returnable by January 11, when it will be the first matter on the board that the bench comprising Justice S B Mhase will take up for hearing. The petition contends that the decision to rename Osmanabad as Dharashiv, without official justification from the state government is against the principles of secularism and an attempt to distort history and pit one community against the other.

The petitioners, all members of the Anti-Renaming of Osmanabad Action Committee, through their counsel Satish Talekar, alleges that the state government has no jurisdiction to changing the name of a village, city, district or town as such matters fall in the residuarysubjects to be dealt with by Parliament. The plea points out that correspondence between the state government and the Centre clearly shows that the power to rename a district lies with the central government.