The Uttar Pradesh government on Monday scrapped the Maitreya Project agreement to develop Kushinagar as an international Buddhist religious and handed over the project to Tourism department.
This decision was taken in the UP cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath here on Monday.
Talking to media persons here on Monday, UP’s Tourism Minister Neelkanth Tiwari said the Maitreya Trust was set up in 2003 to develop an integrated Buddhist circuit that included a tall Buddha statue, hospital, meditation centre, Baudh Vihar, guest house and a pond in Kushinagar for which the government had given 195 acres of land free of cost in 2014.
“When the Yogi Adityanath government assumed office, it issued notices to the Maitreya Trust but the trust did not submit the detailed project report (DPR) despite repeated notices. After waiting for more than two years, the government has decided to scrap the old project and go ahead with a project financed by the state government,” the minister said.
The Maitreya Project is an international organisation and it planned to install a 152-metre (500 feet) colossal statue of Lord Buddha in Kushinagar .
The previous Akhilesh Yadav government had handed over land for the site of the Maitreya Project in Kushinagar. The land is adjacent to the Parinirvana Temple at the place where Shakyamuni Buddha passed into parinirvana, and the Rambhar Stupa which marks the holy site of Buddha’s cremation.
