Forget Gravity, PM Modi's Sardar Patel statue will cost 4 times more than Mangalyaan

Prime Minister Narendra Modi was at his effusive best while praising the scientists of ISRO on their success in putting Mangalyaan into orbit around Mars. “The work that you scientists do, if we apply to daily life, we can transform it completely. It can change governance. It can change the entire system. Our speed can be changed. Such a big contribution is being made by space technology to our lives,” Modi said. [caption id=“attachment_1728313” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  PM Modi congratulates Isro scientists. AFP[/caption] “I believe that our work, the nation’s quality of governance, quality of life, speed of achievements can be changed because of your achievement,” Modi said this morning. However, while the Prime Minister has said that space technology will influence every sphere of life he would perhaps do just as well to learn from the scientists’ ability to stick to a budget. The Mars Orbiter Mission, or Mangalyaan, has been praised for its low budget - just Rs 450 crore - which as we’ve pointed out earlier is a fraction of the cost of other missions to the red planet . As some commentators on social media were quick to point out, the Prime Minister’s pet project the Statue of Unity project along the Sabarmati in Gujarat will cost at least four times as much as putting a satellite in orbit around Mars. The Statue of Unity project received a Rs 200 crore push - almost half the cost of the MOM - in the Modi government’s first union budget. The Gujarat government is also going to chip in with Rs 500 crore. But even with that it amounts to only about a a third of the total budget. According to a report, the lowest bid so far to build the Statue of Unity is Rs 2,980 crore which is Rs 917 crore more than the projected cost of Rs 903 crore. “I believe that our work, the nation’s quality of governance, quality of life, speed of achievements can be changed because of your achievement,” Modi said this morning. It’s not too late to hope that the Rs 2,000 crore, for what can at best be described as a vanity project, finds better use after the success of Mangalyaan.