India is planning to build the world’s tallest statue in northern Uttar Pradesh state, just weeks after breaking the record by inaugurating a statue twice the height of the Statue of Liberty.
The proposed 725-foot high bronze statue of the Hindu god Ram at Ayodhya, his supposed birthplace some 420 miles southeast of New Delhi, will be taller than the 600-foot high tribute to Sardar Patel erected in western Gujarat state, which was built at a cost of £330 million.
The planned height of Ram’s statue, however, will equal that of another monument being planned off Mumbai’s coast to honour the 17th century Hindu warrior king Shivaji.
Officials said Uttar Pradesh’s chief minister Yogi Adityanath, who belongs to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), had on the weekend approved the bronze model of Ram to be constructed on the banks of the Saryu river at Ayodhya.
State information secretary Avaneesh Awasthi said experts were conducting soil and wind tests to select an ‘appropriate spot for the statue’, but declined to provide additional details of either the cost or the monument’s building schedule.
SAM PANTHAKY/AFP
The area around the statue will house a museum portraying Ram and other Hindu gods in addition to depicting Ayodhya’s history.
The temple town of Ayodhya has been at the heart of BJP politics since 1992 when Hindu hardliners tore down a 16th century mosque built by a Mughal king, claiming it marked Ram’s exact birthplace.
Within hours of the mosque’s demolition, sectarian rioting broke out across India leading to the deaths of 2000 people, mostly Muslims.
AP
BJP supporters have been impatient to see a temple to Ram built on the site but any such project has been held up until the Supreme Court rules on what to do with the land. The proposed statue is seen as a placatory effort by the party.
Mr Modi inaugurated the 600-foot high statue of Sardar Patel, dubbed the Statue of Unity, last month. It is 177 feet higher than the Spring Temple Buddha in China, which at 420 feet was previously the world’s tallest.
Built in 46 months, the Statue of Unity weighs 67,000 tonnes and has been built to withstand major earthquakes and high velocity winds.