Santiniketan (IANS) Hundreds of people from India and abroad congregated in the sylvan surroundings of the Visva-Bharati university here as the celebrations of Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore's 150th birth anniversary got off to a colourful start Sunday.
The university, founded by Tagore in 1921, reverberated at dawn to his touching songs as students and teachers - resplendent in traditional dresses - went around the campus in a procession singing his compositions.
Everybody then assembled at Chatimtala - the exact spot under a chatim tree where the poet's father Debendranath had established an ashram way back in 1863 - and took part in prayers that culminated in a rendition of a series of devotional songs composed by the bard, who holds the distinction of having authored the national anthems of two sovereign nations India and Bangladesh.
