The Maitreya Project is an international organisation, operating since 1990,
set up to construct a 152 metre (500 ft) statue of the Maitreya

Maitreya

Maitreya , Metteyya , or Jampa , is foretold as a future Buddha of this world in Buddhist eschatology. In some Buddhist literature, such as the Amitabha Sutra and the Lotus Sutra, he or she is referred to as Ajita Bodhisattva.Maitreya is a bodhisattva who in the Buddhist tradition is to appear on...

 Buddha

Buddhahood

In Buddhism, buddhahood is the state of perfect enlightenment attained by a buddha .In Buddhism, the term buddha usually refers to one who has become enlightened...

, in Kushinagar

Kushinagar

Kushinagar , Kusinagar or Kusinara is a town and a nagar panchayat in Kushinagar district in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is an important Buddhist pilgrimage site, where Gautama Buddha is believed to have attained Parinirvana after his death.-Demographics: India census, Kushinagar had a...

, Uttar Pradesh

Uttar Pradesh

Uttar Pradesh abbreviation U.P. , is a state located in the northern part of India. With a population of over 200 million people, it is India's most populous state, as well as the world's most populous sub-national entity...

, India, along with education and healthcare facilities for the local population. The design brief

Design brief

A design brief is a comprehensive written document for a design project developed in concert by a person representing the business need for design and the designer. The document is focused on the desired results of design – not aesthetics....

 for the statue includes a specification for the statue to last for 1,000 years.

The statue is remarkable in its size and scope; the covering over the internal steel truss

Truss

In architecture and structural engineering, a truss is a structure comprising one or more triangular units constructed with straight members whose ends are connected at joints referred to as nodes. External forces and reactions to those forces are considered to act only at the nodes and result in...

 structure is proposed to be of "approximately 6000 aluminium

Aluminium

Aluminium or aluminum is a silvery white member of the boron group of chemical elements. It has the symbol Al, and its atomic number is 13. It is not soluble in water under normal circumstances....

-bronze

Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...

 panels... cast from resin-bonded sand moulds."

The project was initiated by the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition

Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition

The Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition is a network of Buddhist centers focusing on the Gelugpa tradition of Tibet. Founded in 1975 by Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, who began teaching Buddhism to Western students in Nepal, the FPMT has grown to encompass...

, an organisation within the Gelug

Gelug

The Gelug or Gelug-pa , also known as the Yellow Hat sect, is a school of Buddhism founded by Je Tsongkhapa , a philosopher and Tibetan religious leader...

 school of Tibetan Buddhism

Tibetan Buddhism

Tibetan Buddhism is the body of Buddhist religious doctrine and institutions characteristic of Tibet and certain regions of the Himalayas, including northern Nepal, Bhutan, and India . It is the state religion of Bhutan...

.

Project partners

The controlling corporate body is Maitreya Project International, Isle of Man.
One of the international companies working for the Project is Mott MacDonald Group Limited

Mott MacDonald

The Mott MacDonald Group is an employee-owned company management, engineering and development consultancy serving the public and private sectors world-wide...

, providing their expertise in the tourist industry: "We have worked in all the major Indian states and have been involved in some of the most important tourism related developments in the country... we're able to deliver the complex de-signs [sic] for the Maitreya project".

Finances

The projected budget in US dollars is: $195 million for the statue and throne building, $35 million for health and education and $20 million for development of the "750 acre" site.

Criticism

There has been criticism in the press about some aspects of the Project, including the compulsory acquisition, under "India's Land Acquisition Act

Land Acquisition Act

The Land Acquisition Act of 1894 is a law in India and Pakistan that allows the government to acquire private land in those countries.“Land Acquisition” literally means acquiring of land for some public purpose by government/government agency, as authorised by the law, from the individual landowner...

", by the State Government of 660 acres (2.7 km²) of private land, homes and small farms; which are intended to be leased to the Project, for construction of the statue and related infrastructure, including "landscaped park housing a cathedral, monastery, convent, guesthouse, library and food halls...".
Peter Kedge, Director and CEO of the Maitreya Project has posted a number of replies to these criticisms.

External links

• Maitreya Project website
• Videos posted on YouTube by Maitreya Project
• BBC Documentary
• Pepper, Daniel Giant Buddha's tough love will drive out poor The Scotsman
  The Scotsman
  The Scotsman is a British newspaper, published in Edinburgh.As of August 2011 it had an audited circulation of 38,423, down from about 100,000 in the 1980s....
  
  , September 9, 2007 on The Buddhist Channel
• Registry of Charitable Trusts (RCT) Office of the Attorney General, Department of Justice, State of California
• Aros Architects Kushingar Masterplan with location map and simulated aerial view
• Taipei Times Massive Buddha taking shape in Taiwan Ian Bartholomew, July 12, 2001, p. 11