At 50 metre, Ayodhya's Ram temple to be 3 times taller than buildings around it

LUCKNOW: The upcoming Ram temple in Ayodhya will tower over other residential and commercial buildings around it by almost three times their height. The temple’s grand look is set to emerge with the newly implemented Ayodhya Master Plan-2031 capping the height of “non-temple” building – in what is being termed as a ‘restricted zone’ – to 17.5 metres.
The Ram temple is proposed to have a height of 161 feet or approximately 50 metres, including the ‘pataka’ (pennant).
A top official in the housing and urban planning told TOI that the idea is to ensure that the temple structure appears visibly grand and notable as much as possible. The restricted zone is estimated to be in the radius of around 500 metre (0.5km) from the premises of the temple, which is expected to be completed by 2024. Sources said that the state government aims to provide a “different identity” to the zone where the grand temple is proposed to come up. Officials said that the temple, unsurprisingly, will appear as an imposing structure in the vicinity around it.
Sources in the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust said that the recently completed temple’s plinth alone accounts for 6.5 metre (21 feet) of the total temple’s height. Sources said that approximately 17,000 granite stone blocks of size 5ft x 2.5ft x 3ft have been used in the construction of the plinth by interlocking arrangement. The plinth area is approximately 3500 sq mt, which will act like a solid rock. The construction of the sanctum sanctorum (Garbh Griha) and five mandaps is in full swing, a member of the temple trust said.
The temple will open to devotees in the month of December 2023 for the darshan of ‘Ram Lalla’. For this, the construction work of a Pilgrimage Facilitation Centre, other utilities and infrastructure services in the complex has started, the trust had recently said in a statement.
The state government has also pitched for a ‘common building code’ – a set of local laws relating to how buildings should be designed or built, especially keeping in mind their safe and quality aspects – in Ayodhya which is set to hit the global tourism circuit after the grand Ram temple is thrown open to the public.
The master plan of Ayodhya also entails allocation of designated vending zones and the charging stations for the eco-friendly battery driven auto-rickshaws.