Bhupendra Patel was addressing a gathering at a "Ram Katha" (File)
Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel has said Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah should be given credit for the ongoing construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya and maintained the two senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders have done a lot in preserving the country's culture and faith.
Bhupendra Patel said several agitations took place in the past for a Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, the birth place of Lord Ram in Uttar Pradesh, where a mega temple dedicated to the deity is coming up.
He was addressing a gathering at a "Ram Katha" (recitation of life story of Lord Ram) organised by Vishv Umiyadham in the Nikol area of the city on Thursday night.
"We all know how many agitations took place in the past for the construction of a Ram Temple in Ayodhya. The temple will be ready by 2024. We should give credit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah for that. They contributed a lot in preserving our faith and culture," said the CM.
Vishv Umiyadham is a mega temple complex coming up at Jaspur village near Ahmedabad city at a cost of Rs 1,000 crore. The temple will be dedicated to Maa Umiya, the reigning deity of 'Kadva Patels', a sub-group of the Patidar community.
According to the Vishv Umiya Foundation, the temple, once completed, will be the tallest shrine in the world with an overall height of 504 feet.
Notably, PM Modi had laid the foundation stone for this mega temple complex, spread across 30 lakh square feet, in March 2019 in the presence of lakhs of people.
Besides a grand temple, the complex will house a skill development university, hostels for boys and girls, a job placement and counselling centre for students, a counselling cell for issues related to agriculture and immigration and a centre to resolve social and commercial disputes among community members.
The facility will also have a sports and health complex, an NRI Bhavan, employment training centre, a healthcare unit and apartments for elderly citizens.
In 2019, the trustees had said the temple and skill university building will be ready in 4 to 5 years, while it will take another five years to construct the remaining structures.
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