PM unveils Rs 15,700 cr projects for Ayodhya

New Delhi, December 30

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday inaugurated as well as laid the stone of multiple development projects totalling over Rs 15,700 crore in Ayodhya and said the entire world, including himself, was eagerly waiting for the Ram Temple consecration on January 22.

Addressing a public meeting after inaugurating a renovated railway station and an airport in the city, he said there was a time Lord Ram was “living under a tent, but now he will get a concrete house like the four crore poor people who got ‘pucca’ houses”. “The world is eagerly waiting for January 22. Ayodhya will give a new direction to the development of entire Uttar Pradesh,” said PM Modi, who will be the guest of honour at the consecration ceremony. He appealed to people to light special diyas — Shri Ram Jyoti — in their homes to celebrate the day of ‘pran pratishtha’ at Ram Temple as ‘Deepawali’ and said the campaign to speed up work for building a developed India was getting a new energy from the city of Ayodhya. He urged people to visit Ayodhya only after January 22 due to security and logistic reasons.

Modi said that for any country to reach new heights of development, it was necessary to preserve its heritage. “Today, India is not only beautifying its pilgrimage sites but is also dominating the world of technology,” he said.

Paying tributes to Maharshi Valmiki, after whom the newly built Ayodhya airport is named, Modi said, “The Ramayana written by Maharshi Valmiki is the knowledge path that leads us to Lord Ram. In modern India, Maharshi Valmiki International Airport in Ayodhya Dham will link us to the ‘divya’ (divine), ‘bhavya’ (grand) and ‘navya’ (new) Ram Mandir.” On the trains that he flagged off earlier in the day, Modi said the “trishakti” of Vande Bharat, Namo Bharat and Amrit Bharat is going to rejuvenate the railways. He appealed to the people of the city to take a pledge to make Ayodhya the cleanest city of India.

He also noted the significance of December 30 saying Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose unfurled the Tricolour on this day in Andaman in 1943. “On such an auspicious day associated with the freedom movement, today we are carrying forward the resolve of the Amrit Kaal,” he said. He said the campaign of ‘Viksit Bharat’ was getting new energy from Ayodhya.