India's prime minister marked the nation's 50th anniversary of independence Friday by laying out the challenges ahead and urging citizens to fight corruption by refusing to take bribes.
In an address from the 17th-century Red Fort monument, Inder Kumar Gujral promised to break the link between politicians and criminals and pledged to "make government functioning more trans-parent."Before Gujral's speech, fighter jets etched streams of saffron, white and green - the colors of the Indian flag - across a sky lit by the early morning sun. Helicopters dropped rose petals on the crowd of 10,000.
At the end of the ceremony, 7,000 schoolchildren, waving paper flags, sang the national anthem.
In the remote northeast, Indians stayed away from celebrations after separatist rebels called a strike. In Assam, the largest state in the region, rebels torched three railway stations, and an unspecified number of people were badly burned. One station superintendent was hospitalized with burns over 90 percent of his body.
Elsewhere in the northeast, at least four people were killed in attacks blamed on separatists. Among the dead was a soldier who was killed when suspected rebels ambushed an army convoy in the tea-growing district of Tinsukhia.
In his speech, Gujral promised money for poorer families to care for daughters, who are often denied educational opportunities in a culture where boys are cherished.
He also declared that primary education would be made mandatory for children up to 14 but offered no details on how the government would pay for the program. Similar programs have failed in the past because of a shortage of funding.
As midnight registered Thursday, thousands of people thronged New Delhi's imposing India Gate war memorial. Men who had fought Britain for India's independence rode in jeeps in a parade along the main road leading to the president's palace.
Later, hundreds of people walked barefoot to pay their respects to Mohandas Gandhi at his memorial in New Delhi. Gandhi, known as the mahatma, or "great soul," is the man most Indians believe was the guiding force behind the struggle against colonial rule.