CDS (II) 2021 General Knowledge · Question 104 of 120

Correct — D, Statue of Unity. Panchmuli Lake lies inside the Statue of Unity tourism complex at Kevadia, now renamed Ekta Nagar, in Narmada district of Gujarat. It is one of the dykes of the Sardar Sarovar project on the Narmada, developed as an eco-tourism water body with boat rides that run out across it into forested country under the Vindhya hills. The monument it belongs to is unmistakable: the Statue of Unity is a 182-metre figure of Vallabhbhai Patel standing on Sadhu Bet island in the Narmada, facing the Sardar Sarovar Dam about a hundred kilometres south-east of Vadodara, sculpted by Ram V. Sutar and inaugurated on 31 October 2018. Of the four monuments listed, it is the only one anywhere near the Narmada, and Panchmuli is part of the tourist landscape built around it.

• (a)Statue of Equality — The seated statue of the eleventh-century philosopher Ramanuja, at Muchintal near Hyderabad in Telangana. It is nowhere near the Narmada, and it was not yet inaugurated when this paper was set.
• (b)Thiruvalluvar Statue — The statue of the Tamil poet Thiruvalluvar stands on a rock islet off Kanniyakumari at the southern tip of the peninsula, in the sea rather than beside a lake.
• (c)Dhyan Buddha Statue — The Dhyana Buddha statue is at Amaravati in Andhra Pradesh, on the Krishna. A different river, a different state and a different monument.

The Statue of Unity was built as the centrepiece of a wider tourism development at Kevadia, alongside the Sardar Sarovar Dam on the Narmada. The reservoir and dyke system of that project supplies the water bodies around it, of which Panchmuli is one, and the surrounding country belongs to the Shoolpaneshwar sanctuary landscape in the Vindhya and Satpura foothills. The statue itself commemorates Vallabhbhai Patel, deputy prime minister and home minister in independent India's first government and the man who negotiated the accession of the princely states.

The item is really a test of whether you can place a monument on the map, and the fastest route to the answer is to note that Panchmuli is a lake, then ask which of the four monuments stands in a river valley with a large dam behind it. Kanniyakumari is on the sea, Hyderabad is on the Deccan, Amaravati is on the Krishna, and only Kevadia sits in the Narmada valley. On sourcing, one caution is worth stating plainly: the identification of Panchmuli as the dyke water body inside the Statue of Unity complex comes from state tourism and forest-corporation material rather than from a statute or a survey document, so treat the boating detail as description and the location of the statue itself as the checkable fact the answer rests on.

• The Statue of Unity stands on Sadhu Bet island in the Narmada at Kevadia (Ekta Nagar), Narmada district, Gujarat, facing the Sardar Sarovar Dam.
• It is 182 metres tall, depicts Vallabhbhai Patel, was designed by the sculptor Ram V. Sutar and was inaugurated on 31 October 2018.
• It lies roughly a hundred kilometres south-east of Vadodara, and a twelve-kilometre artificial lake formed by the Garudeshwar weir lies downstream on the Narmada.
• Panchmuli Lake is one of the Sardar Sarovar project dykes within the Statue of Unity tourism campus, opened for boat rides as an eco-tourism activity.
• The Thiruvalluvar statue is at Kanniyakumari in Tamil Nadu, the Statue of Equality at Muchintal near Hyderabad, and the Dhyana Buddha statue at Amaravati in Andhra Pradesh.

• Assuming any famous statue will do; the question is answered by the river, not by the height.
• Confusing the Statue of Unity with the Statue of Equality — one is Patel in Gujarat, the other Ramanuja in Telangana.
• Placing Kevadia in Madhya Pradesh because the Narmada rises there; the dam and the statue are in Gujarat.

As a place-to-monument item, or as a statements question on the Statue of Unity's height, subject and location.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Statue of Unity stands on an island in which river?

  • (a)Tapi
  • (b)Mahi
  • (c)Narmada
  • (d)Sabarmati

  Answer(c) Narmada — it occupies Sadhu Bet island facing the Sardar Sarovar Dam, in Narmada district of Gujarat.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Thiruvalluvar Statue is located at

  • (a)Rameswaram
  • (b)Kanniyakumari
  • (c)Mamallapuram
  • (d)Thanjavur

  Answer(b) Kanniyakumari — it stands on a rock islet off the southern tip of the peninsula, next to the Vivekananda Rock Memorial.