Mangaluru: The International Yoga Day (IDY) was celebrated with fervor on Sunday. A rain break helped, though most of the IDY programmes were arranged indoors keeping in mind the possibility of rain.
The top brass of the district administration  was in attendance at the official IDY celebration organized at the TMA Pai International Convention Centre. Minister for environment, forest and ecology B Ramanath Rai took all concerned by surprise arriving at the venue at 6.55am, ahead of the 8.30am start and going through a rigorous exercise regimen to keep him loose and fit for the IDY activities.

International yoga referee Gopalkrishna Delampady who conducted the proceedings here involved all the top district officials and elected representatives getting them on board a specially erected stage and got them to do few asanas alongside him. If Nalin Kumar Kateel, MP showed his agility with padmasana and bhadda konasana, MLC Ganesh Karnik stretched  to do shashankasana. MLA J R Lobo vowed all with an adroit display of bhujangasana.

Despite the rain, enthusisasm was not diminished among the budding armed forces when  1,417 NCC students of all three wings performed yoga with flexibility in the open on the interlock paved premises of Canara Higher Primary School at Urwa.

Sanghaniketan, the regional headquarters of RSS, a short distance away from this venue, saw the young and the elderly go through the mandated asanas per the common yoga protocol mandated by the ministry of Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy. As many as nine different organisations pertaining to yoga were involved in ensuring that yoga aficionados went through their paces on all four floors of this sprawling complex at one go.