Vadodara: Statue of Unity, world’s tallest statue will remain closed for public visit today as Mondays are reserved for maintenance and cleanliness of statue and associated sites of tourist interest. Some 300 tickets were sold online for this Monday in advance.

According to officials, those tickets will be considered valid for any other day. Out of 300, more than 100 have confirmed they are going to prepone or postpone their visit. Reputed firm BVG India has been hired for cleanliness of statue site and other tourist attraction. It is a mammoth job to keep the area clean.

The statue site was kept opened for tourists last Monday due to Diwali rush in extra ordinary circumstances. But that shall not be the case for other Mondays.

Meanwhile it is learnt that the Governor of Arunachal Pradesh is going to visit the statue site today on invitation of Gujarat government. Various delegations of Gujarat government had visited state capitals and invited the Chief Ministers and Governors to visit the Statue of Unity in November. So far only Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister has paid visit in response.

In other news, on Sunday, 24,541 visitors paid visit to Statue site resulting into Rs 44,68,290 revenue at ticket window. During 1-10 November, 1,03,110 visitors have visited the statue site resulting into Rs. 2.25 crore (Rs. 2,25,31,776) ticket revenue.

Long queues to board buses remains an area of concern for visitors as there are long queues in parking area to board bus to Statue of Unity. Administration has increased the number of buses from 20 to 30 now. It should be noted here that parking space is away from Statue site. Visitors are asked to park their vehicles and board bus to reach Statue site. It’s same way in return journey from statue to parking.

Lack of sitting space, higher rate of food items and water(Rs 30 per bottle and Rs 50 for 125 gram of khaman), lack of shades over bus boarding points(to and from) etc are some of major complains received by site managers that need solution.

DeshGujarat