Kevadiya, Oct 31 (AP/UNB) — India's prime minister has unveiled a towering bronze statue of Sardar Vallabbhai Patel, a key independence leader and the country's first home minister after British colonialists left in 1947.
The state government says at 182 meters (597 feet), it is one of the tallest statues in the word built at a cost of $403 million in Kevadiya, a village in Gujarat state. Both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Patel hail from Gujarat state.
This is a project that we had thought about during the time I was the Chief Minister of Gujarat: PM @narendramodi #StatueOfUnity pic.twitter.com/INHDtBWkiK
— PMO India (@PMOIndia) October 31, 2018
Modi inaugurated the "Statue of Unity" on Wednesday. He had promised the project despite criticism that India as an impoverished nation couldn't afford to spend so much money on a statue.
Patel was known as the "Iron Man of India" for integrating various states in the post-independence era.