India has just made a global statement with its world’s tallest statue. An imposing bronze head of the towering 182 metres statue of country’s first Home Minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel reaches out to the skies in Kevadia, Gujarat on his 143rd birth anniversary. But what is this ‘statue salute’ all about? Can this Statue of Unity be a befitting tribute to the ‘Iron Man of India’, especially when India is struggling to keep pace with its development?
Beyond the talk of unity and national integration that Patel stood for, the world sees the statue as a showcase of India’s growing prosperity and its rise as a global power. But amid this burst of global fame and nationalist fervor, there are some loose ends the government has failed to tie. And this will cause some embarrassment to the nation and its people.
Consider this: Nana Pipaliya, is a village in close proximity to the statue under the “command area” of the Sardar Sarovar Dam. The area remains parched for water despite assurances of water supply from irrigation projects. Over 80 per cent of the population in this area relies on agriculture and with scanty water, farmers in the region face an unpredictable season. There are another 21 villages surrounding the Statue which opposed the project since the forests, water reservoirs and their land is under threat and their primary occupation of agriculture is facing extinction. Many who were promised compensation are still left high and dry. There are debt-ridden farmers being driven to a point of suicide and there are thousands of people defecating in the open. Thousands of Adivasi families living near the Sardar Sarovar dam had been rendered homeless to facilitate the construction of the mammoth structure.
The basic argument is that the money spent on the statue could have gone into projects to develop the region, irrigation of farmland and welfare of the tribal farmers who continue to live in distress.
If India has to prove its love for iconic leaders who made history, every State will pride itself with at least one statue if not more and we will still be counting. Is this the height of patriotism or height of political one-upmanship? And expecting a tourism boom in the region for a turnaround is far-fetched due to its remote tribal location in sharp contrast to the iconic Eiffel Tower which is located in the holiday heartland of Paris.
Yes, Sardar Patel needs to be saluted and honoured, but building gigantic statues is certainly not the way to do it. The ground realities in India are drastically different to those of the western world and the economics in this remote village in Gujarat is not favourable. It comes as a shame when Prime Minister Narendra Modi raised the pitch for integrity there were thousands of villagers observing a day of quiet mourning and deciding not to cook while several others tonsured their heads.
