DHAKA: Construction is set to begin in India on Thursday for the world’s tallest statue, which will stand twice the size of the Statue of Liberty and be made out of melted-down metal and farming equipment.

The tribute to Sadar Patel, the first home minister of independent India who was nicknamed ‘Iron Man’, is set to rise 182 metres from a rocky river island in western Gujarat state.

Once completed it will be the world’s biggest, more than four times higher than the statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro, reports The Straits Times.

Opposition leader Narendra Modi, the prime ministerial candidate for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), is to lay the foundation stone on Thursday, Patel’s birthday.

BDST: 1640 HRS, OCT 31, 2013
RoR/JCK