Life-size replica of Angkor Wat to be built in India
£7.5 million concrete temple will be even bigger than the real thing
A full-scale replica of Cambodia’s legendary world heritage site Angkor Wat is to be built on the banks of the Ganges in India.
It will become a fully functioning Hindu temple - just like the original when it was built in the 12th century before it became Buddhist.
The ground-breaking ceremony for the 10-year project was performed earlier this month by Kishore Kunal, the 61-year-old retired policeman who is driving the project.
The head of the Mahavir Mandir temple trust in Patna, north-east India, wants Indian Hindus to be able to experience their religion’s grandest temple. A trip to Siem Reap in Cambodia, some 3,000 miles from Delhi, is beyond the reach of most.
He said the Virat Angkor Wat Ram Mandir - to give it its full title - will be 222ft by 222ft and 222ft tall at its highest point.
“It will be as majestic as the original and slightly larger,” he told the Guardian. “Those who know me know I complete my projects.”
His trust will finance half the estimated £7.5 million cost of the temple which will be built from concrete clad in granite to keep the price tag down.
The five towers, known as shikaras, will be crafted from fragments of stone using a traditional technique.
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Readers' comments (3)
We could have an Angor Wat shopping centre in East London. It, too, could be "as majestic as the original and slightly larger".
I do question the need to build yet another temple in India. My last visit to India showed that the majority of large temples are loosing their spiritual qualities and becoming money making businesses with a museum feel to them. The money could be spent far better on other resources.
This sounds like a wonderful investment, especially as the former Wat has been taken over by the other lot. These buildings employ a huge amount of centuries old tradition and this project will counter all the other types of buildings go up which surely do not. On my last visit talking with a Mumbai architect with a large practice, he told me all the clients want glass buildings because that is what they see in Europe and other places. He said further, that glass just was not suitable in the Indian climate, but if you did not acquiese the client would go elsewhere for his glass structure. £7.5 m is drop in Indian building ocean.