Showers fail to dampen enthusiasm of audience, performers at Beating Retreat ceremony

Even as the rain continued to fall down near the Raisina Hills, it failed to lower the enthusiasm of a drenched audience which had gathered to witness the Beating Retreat ceremony, marking an end to the four-day-long Republic Day celebrations, at Vijay Chowk on January 29 evening. Naman Sahu, 23, a UPSC aspirant from Chhattisgarh’s Raigarh, said, “We as audience had no right to leave the ceremony in between because all the band groups were also performing all drenched in rain.” “I loved the fact that the entire ceremony was held as per traditions despite the constant rain,” Mr. Sahu added. Dr. Prasanna Raj, a doctor at AIIMS Delhi and originally from Karnataka’s Mysore, said, “My brother, Dr. Kushal Raj Singhvi, had specially come from the U.S. to witness the ceremony. It was the most wonderful experience we have had in our lives.” Drone show cancelled A drone show, said to be India’s biggest with 3,500 indigenous drones, and a 3-D anamorphic projection show on the facade of the North and the South Blocks had to be cancelled due to bad weather, leaving an over-all satisfied audience a bit disappointed. Film writer and actor Atul Tiwari, who scripted the drone show and directed the projection mapping show, said that he had attended the ceremony for the first time and was “mesmerised”.