Puri Shankaracharya Swami Nischalananda Saraswati on Saturday slammed the State Government over its Shreemandir Heritage Corridor Project for the third time in a row.
The Shankaracharya said, “I am not against development. Ruining temples and mutts in the name of development is not justified. It seems the Government will take things seriously only when common people lose their trust on it. Before that, it won’t realise the worth of the common man.”
He said the Government is now adamant on the heritage project as it thinks that the public opinion is in its favour. The BJP is siding with the ruling BJD while the Congress is not a force, he observed.
The seer said, “Heritage sites like Puri have turned into ‘Bhogbhumi’ and a ‘Sura Sundari’ Kendra which should not have happened. Puri has lost its spiritual essence due to the Government’s lack of concern. This sort of Government act also violates Constitutional norms,” he added.
However, Puri BJD MP Pinaki Misra said, “The construction works under the Heritage Corridor Project are going on as per the wish of the Lord Jagannath and none can stop it
“The works are going on round the clock. It is also the wish of the Lord Jagannath that the project is completed at the earliest,” Misra said, adding that the High Court, while deciding a pending petition, would decide if the construction works are carried out as per law or not.
Notably, Bhubaneswar BJP MP Aparajita Sarangi on Friday had said that she wondered how the Puri MP didn’t know that the construction works are being carried out violating law.