A Towering Monument to India’s Road Not Taken
The $400 million spent on the Statue of Unity could have paved over countless potholed highways or irrigated 40,000 hectares of land.
Money no object, for the right cause.
Photographer: Sam Panthaky/AFP/Getty Images
What does strongman showmanship look like? In India, it’s 25,000 tons of steel, 3,550 tons of bronze and 210,000 cubic meters of cement and concrete — towering over the world at a cost of about $400 million.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently unveiled the Statue of Unity in his home state of Gujarat. The likeness is of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, a leader of the independence movement known as the “Ironman of India,” who died in 1950. At 182 meters (597 feet), it’s the tallest such structure in the world — double the height of the Statue of Liberty and more than 40 percent higher than China’s Spring Temple Buddha.