Experts travelled to Kashi, Haridwar, Akshardham for ‘Mahakal Lok’ project: Official

PTI, Oct 11, 2022, 3:37 PM IST

Several domain experts who were part of the Mahakaleshwar Temple corridor project here had travelled to Varanasi, Haridwar and Akshardham temples in Delhi and Ahmedabad while conceptualising its thematic design, a top official has said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is slated to inaugurate the project’s first phase — ‘Mahakal Lok’ — on Tuesday evening amid a festive mood in the holy city, located around 200 km from the state capital Bhopal.

The Rs 856-crore project, under the Ujjain Smart City, started in 2017 and in five years, the entire landscape has undergone a sea change.

Chief Executive Officer of Ujjain Smart City, Ashish Kumar Pathak shared with PTI some of the challenges that were faced while executing the project and the steps taken to achieve the desired goals, including the art and architectural aspects. ”Since it was a religious project, we had to really put all stakeholders together. So, we formed a ‘culture and heritage committee’ with domain experts among others as members. ”We took experts from Kalidas Academy and Sanskrit Academy as well as some old ‘purohits’ from Shri Mahakaleshwar Temple committee to help in conceptualisation,” he said.

Pathak said team members of the ambitious project ”travelled to Kashi, Haridwar, Akshardham temples in Delhi and Ahmedabad” for the mega project.

PM Modi in December 2021 had dedicated to the people the first phase of the Kashi Vishwanath Dham, which has been constructed at a cost of around Rs 339 crore. The project connects the temple premises to the Ganga River besides providing several facilities to devotees. He had laid its foundation stone in March 2019 in his home constituency. The old temple premises has undergone a massive overhaul and grand gateways and ornamental arches have been built in heritage architecture style in four directions. The project, which has expanded the Kashi Vishwanath temple area from only 3,000 sq ft to about five lakh sq ft, and can now accommodate 50,000-75,000 people.

Akshardham temple in Delhi is renowned for its ornaments murals which attracts tourists from near and far. Asked about comparisons being drawn between the two projects by many, Pathak said Kashi Vishwanath corridor and Mahakaleshwar Temple corridor are projects of different nature, and ”I don’t see the two religious sites as competing attractions in people’s mind”.

The CEO of Ujjain Smart City, which executed the project, said a consultancy firm IPE Global was roped in in the beginning, and they also hired experts. Then a plan was made and put before the special purpose vehicle (SPV) that was created for the project.

The suggestions offered were then weightened from multiple perspectives, cultural, religious, etc, and then the final approval was given, he said.

The first phase includes an over 900-m-long corridor — ‘Mahakal Lok’, billed as one of the largest such corridors in India that skirts around the old Rudrasagar Lake. The lake has also been revived as part of the overall redevelopment project around the Mahakaleshwar Temple, one of the 12 ‘jyotirlings’ in the country that gets devotees throughout the year.

The corridor is dotted with 108 ornate sandstone columns in a row bearing decorative ‘trishul’ design on top and ‘mudras’ of Lord Shiva on its faces, and also has gushing fountains surrounded by artistic sculptures of the deity as well as 53 illuminated murals depicting stories from Shiv Puran.

It is also one of the largest Open space Smart City project in India.

”In 2016, in feedback received from citizens’ consultations on the Ujjain Smart City, maximum suggestions were about development of the area around the Mahakaleshwar Temple,” he added.

Asked about the master plan of the area, Pathak said, it was made in 2017 and for a designated area around the temple, ”We have frozen the plan. So any future development in it will have to follow the master plan”.

Another major challenge was the Rudrasagar Lake which had ”turned into a sewer and we created a proper sewer network and made it free from the sewer”, he said.

A senior official of the consultancy firm associated with the corridor development project since 2017 said, ”The area has been transformed from a chaotic, haphazard space into an aesthetic and pleasing sight”.

Pathak said three different committees have been formed comprising multiple stakeholders, adding, ”one committee is of ‘pandits’ as well. Regular meetings have taken place to discuss all aspects in details”.

Mahakal Lok’ development also includes a mid-way zone, a park, a multi-storied parking lot for cars and buses, florist and other shops, solar lighting, a facility centre for pilgrims, water pipeline and sewer line, among other works.

A light and sound system has also been developed, and work on phase two of the project is currently underway, under which Rudrasagar Lake has been rejuvenated.