After being received by the Sports and Youth Affairs Minister Kanti Ganguly at the Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport around 12.30 pm, the baton was put up for public viewing at a gala function in front of the Victoria Memorial Hall. The star-studded event — organised by the Sports and Youth Services Department of the Kolkata Police — was attended by Governor MK Narayanan, Commissioner of Police Goutam Mohan Chakrabarti and Chief Secretary Ardhendu Sen.

From former cricket captain Sourav Ganguly to Indian football captain Baichung Bhutia, veteran footballers Chuni Goswami, P K Banerjee, Prasun Banerjee, Sayyid Nayimuddin and Subrata Bhattacharya, boxer Ali Qamar, former athlete Jyotirmoyee Sikdar, archer Dola Banerjee, former hockey star Gurbux Singh, ace swimmer Bula Choudhury and chess grandmaster Dibyendu Barua, the city’s sporting personalities turned out in strength to hold the historic baton. Cine stars Rituparna Sengupta, Dev, Abir, Raj, Subhasree, Devaleena and Priyanka represented Tollywood.

The organisers, however, appeared unprepared for a programme of this scale. There was absolute chaos at the site? even minister Kanti Ganguly could not find a seat for some time. But there was no dearth of enthusiasm on part of the people and the hundreds of children from various city schools, who entertained the crowd with a cultural programme.

The Queen’s Baton Relay, similar to the Olympic Torch Relay, is held around the world before the Commonwealth Games begin.

With a message from Queen Elizabeth II — the present Head of the Commonwealth ? the baton was released from the Buckingham palace nine months ago. The baton with an inbuilt GPS system, came to Kolkata, after touring Meghalaya.

Initially, rain plays spoilsport

Amid heavy downpour, the baton was taken from the airport to the Bodyguard Lines in a lacklustre manner as there were no waving of schoolchildren along the 15-km route, as it was planned earlier. “Rains have shattered all our plans. We had planned to bring about 5,000 schoolchildren, waving flags along the route till the Bodyguard Lines where the baton will be kept. But the weather has played a spoilsport,” said Kamalesh Chatterjee, secretary, Bengal Olympic Association. The Queen’s Baton will traverse through Burdwan, Panagarh, Durgapur and Asansol covering about 300 kms, before reaching Dhanbad in Jharkhand on August 4.