Parents who changed their son’s name to Putin in 2016 in honour of the Russian leader have pleaded with authorities to let them change it back.
The Dzhurayev family relocated to Russia from their home Tajikistan in the early 2010s, and soon after, in a gesture of gratitude to their new nation and its leader, they formally changed the name of their one-year-old son Rasul to Putin.
However, the pair then regretted their choice and is now working to restore Putin’s birth name; they would not, however, elaborate on their reasons for regret.
Ekaterina Belous, head of the Alexandrovsky district registry office in Vladimir oblast, east of Moscow, told local media: ‘The parents have approached us: They, let me put it this way, feel sorry for what they did.’
‘They want to give the child the name he received at birth.’
However, the child’s cousin, named Shoigu after Russia’s minister of defence, Sergei Shoigu -will be keeping his name for the time being, Belous confirmed.
Young Putin’s grandfather, Rahmon Juraev, is an ardent supporter of the Russian leader and is believed to be the inspiration for the name change.
‘Vladimir Putin is the number one man in the world for me. Strong, smart and educated. My grandson looks very similar to Putin as a child, and I, without hesitation, decided to change the name of the child,’ Jurayev told the BBC Russian Service at the time.
He was reportedly inspired by an Egyptian journalist who also named his son after Vladimir Putin.
The family fled their home in Tajikistan- where Putin was once hailed as an iconic leader- following a fierce civil war in the 1990s.
But since the war in Ukraine began last year, the president has become less popular in Central Asia.
Enlistment officers in Russia have been entering mosques to search for migrants from the Muslim-populated countries of Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.
They have offered them payments and expedited citizenship in return for military service in the Ukraine war.
According to Eurasianet, many have been forced to enlist against their will or tricked into joining.