For many commuters like Sharma, the Metro has brought the Republic Day parade much closer home. The several kilometre walk has now shrunk to just a short walk from Rajiv Chowk Metro station, Barakhamba Metro station or Patel Chowk Metro station - where the trains terminated on Saturday morning - to India Gate.

“Yeh Metro nahi hota to hum parade dekhne nahi aa sakte the,” (Had this Metro not been there, I could not have come to see the parade). Sharma said. He came all the way from Azamgarh district in Uttar Pradesh, exclusively to watch the parade.

Unlike the deserted roads, the train from Dwarka at 7 in the morning was crowded with commuters heading to India Gate. At every station, CISF personnel took a round of the train, scanning for suspicious travellers.

Dhanraj Yadav, a small-time businessman from Najafgarh came to watch the parade with his wife and a four-year-old son. “I wanted my son to feel the parade, watching it on TV is impersonal. And with a small kid I could not have dared to think of coming here. But thanks to Metro,” Yadav said. Hira Lal, a construction contractor from Ashok Vihar in north Delhi also echoed Yadav’s view. “For me it is impossible to walk from Ashok Vihar till here. But since Metro was there I decided to take a chance,” Lal said.

Many people living in Old Delhi who had always walked till India Gate after waking up early in the morning preferred to take Metro this time.