Bhubaneswar, Oct 27 (PTI) Visiting 'Amrit Vatika', the national monument in New Delhi where soil from across the nation will be brought in, would be a pilgrimage for all Indians, Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik said on Friday.

Attending a function ahead of the beginning of the 'Amrit Kalash Yatra' to New Delhi, he thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the 'Meri Mati Mera Desh' programme.

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He said soil has been collected from all the panchayats in the state, and it will be sent to Delhi as part of the programme.

Addressing a press conference, state BJP president Manmohan Samal said 'sacred soil' has been collected from 13,128 villages in 2,720 panchayat areas spread across 314 blocks of the state.

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Samal said PM Modi will place the soil collected from more than 7,500 places at the 'Amrit Vatika', to be built near the National War Memorial in New Delhi.

Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan will flag off the 'Amrit Kalash' special train from the Bhubaneswar station on Saturday.

On this train, participants will carry the 'Amrit Kalash' containers to New Delhi.

The train will reach the Ananda Vihar station near Delhi at 2.30 pm on Sunday.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)