Indian tricolour raised at Rio Olympic Village

Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), Aug.3 (ANI): The Indian tricolour was raised at the Olympic Athletes Village amid the humdrum of Samba beats and cultural performances late last evening. Two-time Olympic mdallist Janeth Arcain, the ex-basketball player who is Mayor of the Olympic Village, was present at the ceremony to mark the Indian flag being raised, while folk dancers performed to the accompaniment of Brazilian rhythms, such as samba, forro and bossa nova. Ace shooter Jitu Rai, who is among the Indian medal hopefuls at these Olympics, was the cynosure of eyes at the ceremony, which was missed by several sportspersons who had not returned from their training programme. The flag-raising is one of the prominent ceremonies at the Olympic Athletes Village, which is organised when a fair number of the country's athletes have checked into the village. The Indians have been arriving in the village in small numbers, but now most have settled in. Several of them arrived at the ceremony after training stints. The other shooters visible easily were Prakash Nanjappa, Gurpreet Singh, Chain Singh, besides some athletes like Manpreet Kaur and Khushbir Kaur, the women's hockey and two swimmers in Sajan Prakash and Shivani Katariya. Also present were officials from the Indian Embassy in Brazil and other officials from India. Indian Olympic Associations's (IOA) President, Hari Ramachandaran presented souvenirs to the Mayor of the Games Village, followed by a similar presentation by Indian continent's Chef-de-Mission, Rakesh Kumar Gupta. India are fielding their largest continent of nearly 120 athletes in 15 disciplines. The Olympic Village is built close to Barra Olympic Park, the main venue cluster. The village was opened last week by Rio's Mayor Eduardo Paes, Rio 2016 President, Carlos Arthur Nuzman and retired basketball player Arcain, the two-time former Olympic medallist who is also Mayor of the village. (ANI)