New flight to cultural consciousness in the silver jubilee year: Special train departs from Raipur under ‘Shri Ramlala Darshan Yojana’
850 pilgrims depart from Raipur for pilgrimage under Shri Ramlala Darshan Yojana — Chief Minister Shri Vishnu Dev Sai extends best wishes
Raipur, July 15, 2025 / Under the ‘Shri Ramlala Darshan Yojana’ launched by the Chhattisgarh government to give shape to the faith and devotion of the people of the state, today 850 devotees from Raipur division departed from Raipur railway station by special train for the darshan of Ayodhya Dham. On the commencement of this holy journey, Chief Minister Shri Vishnu Dev Sai extended his best wishes to the devotees and wished for their journey to be auspicious.
Chief Minister Shri Sai said that this pious journey of providing free darshan of our ‘Bhancha Ram’ — Shriram Lala — to the devotees is going on continuously. This journey is realizing the guarantee of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, in which he had resolved to provide an opportunity to every citizen of the country to have darshan of Lord Shri Ram.
He said that under the “Shri Ramlala Darshan Yojana”, the government had set a target of sending 20,000 devotees to Ayodhya Dham by March 2024, but due to the unique faith, enthusiasm of the people of the state, and the commitment of the government, this number has exceeded 22,000. The devotees are also fortunate to have the darshan of Kashi Vishwanath Dham in this journey.
Chief Minister Shri Sai said that a budget of ₹36 crore has been approved for this scheme in the financial year 2025-26. So far, in the last one and a half years, 27 special trains have departed from various divisions of Chhattisgarh to Ayodhya Dham carrying devotees.
The Chief Minister said that Shri Ramlala Tirth Darshan Yojana is not just a religious journey, but a historic initiative towards empowering the cultural consciousness of Chhattisgarh. The government’s aim is that every citizen of the state, especially the elderly and the underprivileged, should be able to visit the birthplace of Lord Shri Ram once in their lifetime.
The ‘Shri Ramlala Darshan Yojana’, which was started on the initiative of Chief Minister Shri Vishnu Dev Sai, has now become deeply connected with the public life of the state. In this series, the first special train of the financial year 2025-26 departed from Raipur railway station for Ayodhya Dham today. On this occasion, Revenue, Sports and Youth Welfare Minister Shri Tankram Verma flagged off the train at 1:00 pm. During the departure of the train, platform number 7 of Raipur railway station echoed with the slogans of Jai Shri Ram. A special atmosphere of enthusiasm and devotion was seen among the pilgrims and their families. The passengers were welcomed with traditional Chhattisgarhi folk dance and folk instruments, while the representatives of IRCTC greeted them by applying tilak.
On this occasion, MLAs Shri Purandar Mishra, Shri Motilal Sahu, Guru Khushwant Sahib, President of Chhattisgarh Tourism Board Shri Neelu Sharma, President of Citizen Supply Corporation Shri Sanjay Srivastava, President of State Waqf Board Dr. Salim Raj, Secretary Culture and Tourism Dr. Rohit Yadav, Managing Director of Tourism Board Shri Vivek Acharya, Collector Raipur Dr. Gaurav Singh, along with senior officials and representatives of Railways and IRCTC were present.
It is noteworthy that this scheme was conceptualized by Chief Minister Shri Vishnu Dev Sai with the aim of providing the people of the state the opportunity to visit Ayodhya Dham once in their lifetime. For this, an MOU was signed between Chhattisgarh Tourism Board and IRCTC on February 23, 2024. The formal launch of the scheme took place on March 5, 2024, from Raipur, when Chief Minister Shri Sai himself flagged off the first train. After this, special trains were also operated from Bilaspur, Sarguja and Durg-Bastar (Joint) divisions. Last year, about 22,100 devotees visited Ayodhya Dham through this scheme. Weekly special trains will continue to operate from each division under the scheme.
