Sometimes guilt pushes for better results. Thus Chatter woke up dot at four in the brahm mahurat. Even though he left home at five. We were able reach Rajpath in the darkness of the dawn. It was no less than grand theatre going on there.

Never was Delhi be heard and felt from the pride and the energy with which they marched past. With the bands of each regiment leading the way. The drums, the beats, the smell of the sweating young, the valour in the air. The discipline, the clacking of the iron bar beneath their marching boots to the tar ground woke us all up.

The mist, the vapours coming out of mouths while a woman officer commanding against the street lamps of Rajpath takes you close to India’a colonial cold faced armies. The practise and improvisation that has gone in the making of them. Oneness in the motion. The pride. It felt like they were owning the day. It felt like they made it our day. Whole, united. It was a day to feel the progress of this nation, the songs of the ancient names being sung. When only wind moved, and each and every person seen stood motionless. When the national anthem ran through our nerves together.

A day that turned long. A self-imposed salt restriction that later allowed only the monkeys for a probable lynching, earning saffron in the milk before the ruins arrived. One has to act tough and particularly merciless with the unemotional. I couldn’t have sliced and stabbed their stomachs from my ever present knife, yet I for a tap drop moment was ready to even do that.

Coming times are going to be exciting. We are in a good flow.