The ‘City of Joy’ opened its heart to the cricket world as a dazzling Bollywood-style opening ceremony kicked off the sixth edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL) on Tuesday, with American rapper Pitbull and superstar Shah Rukh Khan stealing the limelight.
The city let its hair down with SRK, Katrina Kaif and Deepika Padukone grooving to the desi moves, leaving the healthy turnout at the Salt Lake Stadium enthralled.
It reached a crescendo when the evening’s biggest attraction of them all, Pitbull, took to the stage. The 120,000 capacity football stadium transformed into a magical kaleidoscope of Rabindra Sangeet, Bollywood dance, songs and, above all, unfettered enthusiasm as the 2013 leg formally opened with all the nine team captains taking the ICC Spirit of Cricket Pledge, ‘Play hard, play fair’.
Flying drummers, Chinese percussionists, fireworks were the some of the other attractions that were on offer for the event.
After that a collection of balloons rose slowly and smoothly into the hot air above to the sound of drums, music and the cheers of people, with a performer carrying the winner’s trophy.
The 1 hour and 45 minute extravaganza, which was high on entertainment, have surely made the 60,000-plus turnout forget the controversial build up cash-rich T20 league.
It was a flying female performer’s acrobatic descend on the dais with the trophy that stunned everybody. The performer handed the trophy to defending champions KKR’s skipper Gautam Gambhir.
All the captains beginning with Mahendra Singh Dhoni, skipper of the most successful franchise Chennai Super Kings, signed on the ICC Fair Play pledge.
Padukone made an appearance on the stage from the cutout of her mask as she danced to the tunes of the ‘tumi ho tumi ho shakha’.
Katrina made an entry on a chariot as the crowd roared to the tunes of her popular dance numbers in the long Bollywood segment.
Khan kept everybody waiting before making his entry after 45 minutes into the ceremony with the popular ‘main hoon don’ number.
