BENGALURU: The mammoth tribute to martyrs, the 75-foot-tall Veeragallu, has missed the Vijay Diwas deadline fixed by the government and could be ready for public viewing at the National Military Memorial (NMM) only by mid-March. The complicated task of erecting the 450-tonne victory stupa is stated to be the reason for the latest delay.
B Shivashankar, Engineer Member, BDA, ruled out any laxity and said finishing touches were presently being given for the monolith, planned nine years ago. The statue reached the Memorial, located adjacent to the Indira Gandhi Musical Fountain, on June 26, 2019, after taking 22 days to cover a distance of 50 km on a trailer. Since then, it has missed many deadlines.
“It is the only one of its kind in the country as it is a monolith. An intricate process is under way. Erecting it alone took us 15 days with the help of jacks and mammoth cranes and it was an extremely complex job and had to be done very slowly. It has been completed without a single scratch to the monolith,” Shivashankar said.
“Removal of the structures used to carry out the erection alone took another 10 days,” he added.
The cost of carving the statue worked out to Rs 1 crore while transporting it along the 50-km distance on a trailer from the Koira quarry in Devanahalli to the NMM, cost a whopping Rs 5.46 crore, said another BDA official. The names of 22,600 martyrs are etched on the platform on which the Veeragallu is being erected.
“The platform needs to be given a granite finish and this could take a fortnight. The architect is presently deciding upon the right kind of finish to be provided to the Veeragallu. These are all finishing works only,” the Engineer Member added.
The internal deadline fixed is January 16. A senior official said that the pending works could take much longer. “I think mid-March is when everything would get completed and the statue would be ready for public viewing,” he added.