Ready to enjoy the fruit: Wait over for man who designed Ram temple

I am proud that after my grandfather, who oversaw the reconstruction of the Somnath temple, another prestigious temple project will find its links with my family, says Sompura

Chandrakant Sompura, 77, is both elated and relieved. He has waited nearly three decades for the day that arrives tomorrow, when the foundation stone of the Ram temple at Ayodhya will be laid. And Sompura is the man who has designed the temple.

“I am especially proud that after my grandfather, who designed and oversaw the reconstruction of the Somnath temple (in Saurashtra, Gujarat), another prestigious temple project will find its links with the Sompura family,” the septuagenarian, who likes to be known as “temple architect”, tells Business Standard.
 

Having submitted a revised design for the temple structure (to be built by Larsen & Toubro) in June, Sompura says he is now ready to enjoy the fruit of his labour with his sons, Nikhil (55) and Ashish (49), and grandson Ashutosh (28), supervising the work. The patriarch will, however, have the final say over the implementation of the design.
 

From the first set of designs prepared in the 1990s, the Ram temple has undergone several changes after the Supreme Court verdict last year. For instance, instead of two domes, the temple will now feature five domes along with a shikhar (tower) over the sanctum sanctorum. The temple’s height and area have also been increased from 141 sq ft and roughly 15,000 sq ft to 161 sq ft and 30,000 sq ft, respectively.
 

Temple construction norms based on Hindu tradition mandate that no metal be used. The project will, therefore, see use of pink sandstone, mined from Bansi Paharpur in Rajasthan, the same stone used in the Akshardham temples in Delhi and Gandhinagar.
 

The temple is being built in the Nagar style of architecture that is prevalent across states such as Gujarat and Rajasthan, among other places. Yet, says Ashish, except for the revised measurement, there have been no changes to the overall design for a reason.

“The design has been publicised so much over the years that it is now ingrained in the minds of the people, so we did not want to change it. Everyone now has an idea how the temple will look like and we want it to remain like that,” he says.
 

He adds that when the court verdict in November 2019 paved the way for the construction of the Ram temple, the family began working on the design that was prepared some 30 years ago. “But with such widespread attention and decades of dispute likely to attract more devotees to the temple, we had to rework it to expand the project by almost double,” he adds. So, instead of 200,000 cubic feet, 350,000 cubic feet of sandstone will now go into the construction.
 

While he has no formal education in modern architecture, Sompura Sr takes pride in the hands-on training and education he has accumulated in sculpting and temple building according to “vastu shastra”, the traditional Indian system of architecture. “Everything that I know has been taught by my grandfather,” he says, recalling the early days with the man who designed the Somnath temple in the 1940s.
 

Sompura has designed and built over 100 temples in India and abroad, including the Ambaji temple in Banaskantha, and the Swaminarayan temple in London (known as Neasden temple and said to be the largest in the world).
 

According to the design, the Ram temple will be two-storeyed and situated on a raised platform. All four features typical of a Hindu temple — chauki (verandah), nirtyamandap (semi-covered porch), gudh mandap (covered porch) and garbha gruh — are part of it. There will be statues carved on each of the columns, with the idol in the garbha gruh in marble. The construction work is likely to take around three years.
 

One of the peculiarities of the temple compound, which will have four gates, is the southern gate. “Temples in northern and western India are built according to the Nagar style where the garbh gruh is emphasised by an elevated top above it. The ones in southern India are built around the Dravida style, which emphasises the entrance. Hence, you see gopuram, or the elevated designs at the entrances of temples, in southern India. In a fusion of the two styles, the southern gate of the Ram temple compound has been designed as a gopuram,” he says.