Ram Lalla Idol At Ayodhya Carved Out Of 2.5 Billion-Year-Old Black Granite
NDTV
The stone used to create the 51-inch Ram Lalla idol is special black granite brought all the way from Karnataka.
The idol of Ram Lalla or infant Lord Ram found a home on Monday with a Pran Pratishtha ceremony by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the new Ayodhya temple. The stone used to create the 51-inch idol is special black granite brought all the way from Karnataka.
"The stone is 2.5 billion years old," confirms HS Venkatesh, Director of the National Institute of Rock Mechanics (NIRM), Bengaluru, the national facility that helped in testing the stone using physico-mechanical analysis. The NIRM is the nodal agency to test rocks for Indian dams and nuclear power plants.
Dr Venkatesh says, "The rock is highly durable and resistant to climatic variation and will sustain thousands of years in this subtropical zone with minimum maintenance."
