Aim to make I-Day celebrations Telangana-specific, memorable: K Keshava Rao

HYDERABAD: Celebrating Raksha Bandhan with tricolour rakhis, screening Gandhi, one of the most iconic movies of all time in 562 theatres and, possibly, Oscar award winning music director AR Rahman’s concert - these are some of the programmes the State government wants to organise as part of the “Swatantra Bharata Vajrotsava Dwi Saptham” to mark the 75th Independence Day.

After his relations with Prime Minister Narendra Modi soured, Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has come up with his own plans to celebrate the Independence Day rivalling the Centre’s Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav.

Initially, when the Modi government announced nationwide Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav to commemorate 75 years of Independence, the State government had thought of conducting different programmes for 75 weeks. But, now it has chalked out plans with specific reference to Telangana.

The interesting part is the decision to celebrate Raksha Bandhan on August 12, which falls amid the two-week long I-Day fete from August 8 to 22. Raksha Bandhan is one of the main festivals observed by the RSS to foster community bonding. Releasing the logo for the Swatantra Bharat Vajrotsavalu, K Keshava Rao, chairman of the committee set up for overseeing the arrangements, said, “We are focusing on Raksha Bandhan as part of the 75th I-Day fete to improve human relations.”