Kumbhakarna

G.N. MOHAN, driving down from Hyderabad to Bangalore on a rainy evening, spots Kumbhakarna being furiously woken from his slumber to fight the vanara sene. But wait…

Not on the pages of Ramayana, but at a construction site on the Andhra-Karnataka border.

The statue tells a story, of course, but there is another story inside it. This is an auditorium. The head is the stage, the belly is the gallery, and the legs are the entry and exit points.

The statue was conceived by former Anantapur Collector Someshkumar and given shape to by Visakhapatnam-based Architect Venkat three years ago to make people alive to issues like HIV/AIDS, corruption and environmental pollution. “Though the ‘concrete’ Kumbhakarna will continue to sleep, we want people to awaken and shed their indifference to the problems facing the society,” District Tourism Officer Biju George says.

I must admit, I for a moment wondered if the entry and exit were the same :p