NEW DELHI: The main railway station in Ayodhya will now be known as “Ayodhya Dham”. The completely revamped station is set to be inaugurated by Prime Minister
Narendra Modi
on Saturday, top railway officials said.
Currently, there are nine such railway stations that have “Dham” suffixed to their names and five of them are in Uttar Pradesh. Sources said the proposal for change of name of any station comes from the state government and the Centre usually approves them.
“Ayodhya being the birthplace of Lord Ram, it’s appropriate to rename the main station as
Ayodhya Dham
,” said an official.
The stations that have been renamed by adding Dham include Nabadwip Dham in West Bengal, Chitrakut Dham and Maa Barahi Devi Dham in UP, and Vidyapati Dham in Bihar.
Ayodhya Dham station will comprise lifts, escalators, a tourist information centre and medical facilities to meet the demand of tourists. According to estimates, approximately 50,000-60,000 people will visit Ayodhya daily. The refurbished station also has murals of Lord Ram.
Railway officials said the PM will also flag off one Vande Bharat train (Ayodhya-Delhi) and an Amrit Bharat train (Ayodhya-Sitamarhi) on Saturday. He will also virtually flag off five more Vande Bharat trains on Vaishno Devi-New Delhi, Jalna-Mumbai, Coimbatore-Bengaluru, Amritsar-Delhi, and Mangaluru-Madgaon routes. Another non-AC Amrit Bharat train will also be flagged off to run on Bangalore-Malda route.
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