India to Construct World's Largest Buddha Statue

Peter Popham
The Independent (London)

June 18, 2001

The biggest Buddha statue in the world will soon begin to rise in
India's poorest state, Bihar. Construction of the vast image, which will
stand nearly twice as high as America's Statue of Liberty, is due to
begin in September and be completed in 2005.

The Buddha Maitreya, the "Buddha of the Future," will be 500 feet (150 meters) high and the eye-boggling centrepiece of a 35-acre (14-hectare) garden, close
to the pilgrimage center of Bodhgaya.

It was under a peepul tree in Bodhgaya 2,500 years ago that the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni, attained enlightenment. He subsequently began preaching the dharma (Buddhist law) that established one of the great religions.

The vast Buddha will sit on a throne, which is itself a 17-story building. Within the structure, additional Buddhas will be on display—a 40-foot statue of Maitreya in the atrium and 100,000 small Maitreyas, called tsa-tsas, covering one wall.

"From the main atrium, elevators will convey visitors up to a large Shakyamuni Buddha prayer hall, shrine rooms, and rooftop terraced gardens," says the press material describing the project. "From there, visitors can travel upwards into the body of the statue, where there will be more shrine rooms in various levels."

For Spirituality or Tourism?

The project, Maitreya Project International, is budgeted at U.S. $150 million, which is being raised from donations of the faithful.

The U.K. engineering firm that has been given the project, Mott MacDonald, has been told to come up with a structure that will "operate for 1,000 years without major renewal works, while enhancing the lives of those using the project and the lives of those living in the region."

Allan Ockenden, its project director, told The Independent, "The two primary spaces inside will accommodate 6,000 people at one time. We estimate there will be two million visits per year."

But among the impoverished peasants in the vicinity, the project has aroused deep misgivings.

The Gram Granrajya Manch, or Forum of Village Republics, has written to the project's directors saying: "Bodhgaya is being developed not so much as a center of spirituality but as a focal point of the tourism industry."

The letter goes on: "In the name of the Buddha and the development of Bodhgaya, the villages are being affected adversely. Self-sufficient, agro-based communities are deteriorating rapidly. The negative effects of the tourist industry and market forces are daily staring us in the face. A few local people have overnight become millionaires—but a great many are reduced to poverty."

So, what is the statue for?

In his response to the villagers' concerns, Peter Kedge, the project director, explained: "The great quality of holy objects is that, irrespective of motivation, circumambulating, making offerings, making prayers, and otherwise venerating them creates positive karma in proportion to the size of the holy object. Building holy objects is, therefore, the easiest way to offer benefit to living beings."

Motives Questioned

The initiative for the project came from a Tibetan Buddhist monk, Lama Thubten Yeshe, who conveyed his desire to a disciple, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, the project's spiritual adviser.

"Lama Yeshe advised me before he passed away to build a very large statue of Maitreya Buddha at Bodhgaya," said Lama Zopa. "Our main goal is not the statue itself. It is the peace and happiness of all beings."

Huge images have been a feature of Buddhism for at least 1,700 years. The two giant Buddhas in Afghanistan destroyed by the Taliban this year may be no more than a memory now, but huge Buddhas—modern as well as ancient—can be found in Thailand, Sri Lanka, Japan, and other Buddhist countries.

India, however, is no longer a Buddhist country. Today, the main Buddhist pilgrimage sites in Bihar, including Bodhgaya, are supervised jointly by Hindu and Buddhist priests. Hinduism has adopted Buddha as an avatar of the god Vishnu, and squabbling is endemic.

But the objections of the villages are more fundamental.

"The unrest and suffering in the world today is a product of the consumer/materialist culture," the villagers said in their letter. "Can peace be attained through devotion to a statue? What will our villages have to gain?"

(C) 2001 The Independent