The Statue of Unity

The world's tallest statue is fast becoming the most popular one

India's Statue of Unity (SOU) is currently the world's tallest one at 182 meters. This colossal likeness of India's first Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister of independent India, Sardar Vallabhai Patel, is fast turning out to be a major Indian tourist destination. The number of visitors to the SOU already outpaces those who visit the Statue of Liberty in New York, and by March 2021, more than five million visitors had seen the SOU and other tourist attractions around it.

History: Sardar Patel has a very close association with the union of India as the person responsible for adding non-British territory to the country after its independence. When the British made India Independent, the country had two domains, one which the British ruled, and the rest comprised 562 princely states.

The princely states had the option of ceding to India or Pakistan or remaining independent. To his credit, Patel used a combination of diplomacy, gentle force, and in the extreme, threats to make the princely states accede to India. 

Thus, the Indian union of 28 states and nine union territories as of September 2021 resulted from Patel ensuring amalgamation of British India and territories outside it.

One nickname of Sardar Patel is Iron Man of India for his resolve to face the British and handle the tumultuous refugee crisis in the aftermath of the Indian partition in 1947. 

The SOU is thus a fitting tribute to one of India's key freedom fighters and able ministers in its first central government.

Sardar Vallabhai Patel Rashtriya Ekta Trust (SVPRET): The state government of Gujarat set up SVPRET in 2013 to plan, construct, maintain and manage the SOU complex, including the statue. 

One of the unique SVPRET initiatives was a collection of used iron implements from farmers across India, which yielded 136 tons of steel. The SOU stands on a foundation containing steel rebars from 109 tons of iron implements that farmers contributed. Similarly, near its exit, the SOU has a Wall of Unity with soil from different parts of India.

The sculptor of SOU is Padma Bhushan Ram Sutar, who made three statues of 3, 18, and 30 feet to provide the detailing required to complete the 182 m. or 597 ft. SOU. You can see a likeness of the SOU at the Sardar Vallabhai International Airport in Ahmedabad after SVPRET approved Sutar's design. The statue's making active three-dimensional scanning of the scale models to convert the external layer into bronze casts. 

As India had no metallurgical facilities to make giant bronze casts for the SOU, the Chinese Jiangxi Tongqing Metal Handicrafts company's TQ Art Foundry made SOU casts.

The SOU's height of 182 m. represents the number of seats in the Gujarat state assembly. The statue has two 250 tonne dampers for stability.

An international consortium supervised the SOU construction by India's L&T, which took 57 months to plan, make and commission the statue.  

You can watch glimpses of the statue of unity construction in this video - How L&T built the Statue of Unity. The SOU is on Sadhu Bet hill, whose height L&T reduced from 70 to 55 meters for the statue's placement. Originally, Sadhu Bet was an island in the Narmada, and with the coming up of the SOU, the path to it connects land with the erstwhile island.

SOU has 3550 tonnes of bronze plates with macro and micro panels which L&T has welded together on site. 

If you watch closely, you can discern the lines along which the statue's makers have welded together the external bronze panels. Bronze is prone to developing a patina – or a light green layer from oxidation, and you can now see that natural phenomenon on Sardar Patel's statue.

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled the Statue of Unity on 31 October 2018 on Sardar Patel's 143rd birth anniversary. 

SOU is a confluence of Indian design and engineering skills ably aided by international experts from many countries.

What to see at the SOU: The SOU is a complex of gardens, the SOU, a museum, a viewing gallery, and the wall of unity at the exit. SOU buses bring visitors from the ticketing counter to the SOU bus stand, from where visitors cross two security screening points and enter the path leading to the SOU. 

SOU has both travelators (moving walkways) and escalators to enable easy access to visitors. Though you can see the SOU from seven kilometers around, visitors become familiar with its gigantic size when they arrive at the statue's foot and find its toes are as tall as adults!

Visitors wanting to go to the viewing gallery at 153 m. must buy a more expensive ticket than the one to visit only the statue and the museum. The statue's two legs hold two elevators each which take visitors to the viewing gallery. At the gallery, visitors can also see the inner steel scaffolding that reinforces the statue to get an idea of how the statue's interiors are.

The SOU's pedestal houses a museum whose skylights have a garden around the openings, allowing natural light to the space below. In addition, the Bengaluru company EDC Creative Concepts has set up an experience center at the SOU to showcase and highlight the life and contributions of Sardar Patel. The center also has information on the Sardar Sarovar dam, audiovisuals on making the Statue of Unity, and the life of tribals who live near the SOU.  

The SOU's attractions include a thirty-minute Daily Evening Laser Show that the Indian company Pyramid Technologies used 51 Christie Crimson laser projectors for the daily evening audiovisual show. Another SOU accomplishment is that the site has the largest deployment of laser projectors for its thirty-minute performance in the evening. This popular event showcases Sardar Patel's life in colorful lights that shine on his statue for a quick glimpse into the events in his life and his contribution to the Indian nation.  

The SOU complex has thoughtful facilities, including wheelchairs for physically challenged visitors, clean washrooms, free drinking water, and an air-conditioned food court with a wide choice. SOU also is the boarding for Narmada Riverboat cruises.

You can book SOU and other attractions tickets at the ticketing center or online. In addition, SOU allows digital tickets through QR code scanners.

Kevadiya now has rail connectivity through a new railway station and trains that come there from across India. Kevadiya is also accessible by road from Ankleshwar and Vadodara.

SOU has attracted widespread attention in under three years since its inception and is quickly on its path to becoming a very popular tourist destination among Indian and foreign tourists.