Bhubaneswar: A day after Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik launched ‘Amrit Kalash Yatra’ under ‘Meri Maati, Mera Desh’ programme, Union Minister of Education Skill Development & Entrepreneurship, Dharmendra Pradhan on Saturday flagged off the special train, carrying urns with soil collected from 13,128 villages of the state, at Bhubaneswar railway station here on Saturday.
‘Meri Maati Mera Desh’ campaign, which was launched on August 9, is a tribute to the brave freedom fighters and heroes, who sacrificed their lives for the country. A number of Amrit Kalash special trains are being run across the country for participants to arrive in New Delhi from October 28-30 for the culmination of the campaign.
According to sources, the sacred soil collected in urns from 2720 panchayats in 314 blocks of Odisha arrived in Bhubaneswar on Friday and was brought to the railway station in a grand procession this morning.
“Today, BJP office bearers and volunteers left for Delhi with soil collected from home of freedom fighters and soldiers in Odisha. The soil will be utilised in the ‘Amrit Vatika’ being created in the national capital,” said Dharmendra.
BJP state president Manmohan Samal, Balasore MP and former Union Minister Pratap Shadangi, former state president Sameer Mohanty and Bhubaneswar MP Aparajita Sarangi were present at the flagging-off ceremony.
The Amrit Kalash Yatra special train will reach Anand Vihar Terminal, New Delhi, at 2.30 pm on Sunday.
Amrit Vatika will be built near the National War Memorial by fusing the soil that would arrive in 7500 urns from across the nation along with saplings and stand as a grand symbol of ‘Ek Bharat Shresth Bharat’.
