India celebrates Republic Day with military parade

Thousands of people braved morning chill on a ceremonial boulevard to watch a display of the country's military power and cultural diversity on Wednesday, though the colourful spectacle was curtailed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nearly 500 schoolchildren, folk dancers, police and military battalions, floats and stunt performers on motorbikes paraded from the president's palace through the tree-lined refurbished boulevard of Rajpath. President Ram Nath Kovind took the salute from the marching columns, which also included a camel-mounted regiment with its mustachioed riders led by shiny brass bands with tubas. Republic Day marks the anniversary of the adoption of the country's constitution on January 26, 1950. India won independence from British colonial rule in 1947.