NEW DELHI, Jan 15: The fund raising drive for seeking people’s aid for the construction of the Ram Janmabhoomi temple in Ayodhya was kicked off on Friday with the President Ram Nath Kovind making the first contribution to the fund with a donation of Rs 5.01 lakhs.
The President made the contribution to the Ram Janmabhoomi Teerath Kshetra Trust, set up by the government to look after the construction and management of the temple.
A delegation comprising Vishva Hindu Parishad’s international working president Alok Kumar, Govind Dev Giri, treasurer of the Ram Janmabhoomi Teerath Kshetra Trust and others had come to seek the President’s contribution for the construction to the temple. “He is the first citizen of the country so we went to him to initiate this drive. He donated a sum of Rs 5,01,000,” Alok Kumar said.
The VHP and associated organisations have launched a fund-raising campaign — Sri Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir Nidhi Samarpan Abhiyan — from January 15 to February 5 where they will reach out to Hindu families in different states to collect funds for Ram temple. Retired officials, including Nripendra Mishra, former Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, and K K Sharma, former BSF D-G, are among those associated with the committee set up by the trust to look into various aspects of the temple construction.
The trust estimates that the temple construction would cost about Rs 1,100 crores including about 400 cores required for the main temple. Meanwhile, the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan also contributed Rs one lakh for the temple construction.
(Manas Dasgupta)