AKSHAYA K: REPORT ON VIRTUAL TOUR TO INDIA GATE, NEW DELHI

RePORT ON VIRTUAL TOUR TO INDIA GATe, NeW DeLHI

As a part of the first year B.Ed. program, a virtual tour session was conducted by the Sree Narayana Training college, Nedunganda on 22-06-2021. The session began at 10.00am through Google meet. The session was handled by Smt. Chitra S, Assistant Professor, SNTC. she gave a detailed presentation about virtual tour and also briefed on how to make a 360^ovideo using various softwares and applications. She then asked the students to write a report on virtual tour by visiting any monument virtually. Th session ended at 12.00pm.

A virtual tour is a simulation of an existing location, usually composed of a sequence of videos or still images. It may also use other multimedia elements such as sound effects, music, narration, and text. It is distinguished from the use of live television to affect tele-tourism. The phrase "virtual tour" is often used to describe a variety of videos and photographic-based media. Panorama indicates an unbroken view, since a panorama can be either a series of photographs or panning video footage. However, the phrases "panoramic tour" and "virtual tour" have mostly been associated with virtual tours created using still cameras. Such virtual tours are made up of a number of shots taken from a single vantage point. The camera and lens are rotated around what is referred to as a no parallax point (the exact point at the back of the lens where the light converges).

So as a part of this activity I chose to visit INDIA GATe, an iconic monument of India.(CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE 360^o VIRTUAL TOUR)India Gate, official name Delhi Memorial, originally called All-India War Memorial, monumental sandstone arch in New Delhi. It is about 138 feet (42 meters) in height. It is a war memorial located astride the Rajpath, on the eastern edge of the "ceremonial axis" of New Delhi, formerly called Kingsway. It stands as a memorial to 70,000 soldiers of the British Indian Army. The memorial-gate was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, who was not only the main architect of New Delhi, but a leading designer of war memorials. He was a member of the I.W.G.C., and one of Europe's foremost designers of war graves and memorials. He designed sixty-six war memorials in Europe, including the highly regarded cenotaph, in London, in 1919, the first national war memorial erected after World War I, for which he was commissioned by David Lloyd George, the British prime minister.^[3] The memorial in New Delhi, like the Cenotaph in London, is a secular memorial, free of religious and "culturally-specific iconography such as crosses". Lutyens according to his biographer, Christopher Hussey, relied on "elemental mode", a style of commemoration based on "universal architectural style free of religious ornamentation".

The history of this monument is that it was part of the work of the Imperial War Graves Commisson (IWGC), which came into existence in December 1917 for building war graves and memorials to soldiers killed in the First World war. The foundation stone of the All-India War Memorial was laid on 10 February 1921, at 4:30 PM, by the visiting Duke of Connaught in a solemn soldierly ceremony attended by Officers and Men of the Indian Army, Imperial Service Troops, the Commander in Chief, and Chelmsford, the Viceroy. On the occasion, the viceroy said, "The stirring tales of individual heroism, will live for ever in the annals of this country", and that the memorial which was a tribute to the memory of heroes, "known and unknown” would inspire, future generations to endure hardships with similar fortitude and "no less valour".The King, in his message, read out by the Duke said "On this spot, in the central vista of the Capital of India, there will stand a Memorial Archway, designed to keep" in the thoughts of future generations "the glorious sacrifice of the officers and men of the Indian Army who fought and fell". During the ceremony, the Deccan Horse, 3rd Sappers and Miners, 6th Jat Light Infantry, 34th Sikh Pioneers, 39th Garhwal Rifles, 59th Scinde Rifles (Frontier Force), 117th Mahrattas, and 5th Gurkha Rifles (Frontier Force), were honored with title of " Royal " in recognition of the distinguished services and gallantry of the Indian Army during the Great War".

Amar Jawan Jyoti, or the flame of the immortal soldier, is a structure consisting of black marble plinth, with reversed L1A1 Self-loading rifle, capped by war helmet, bound by four urns, each with the permanent light (Jyoti) from compressed natural gas flames, erected under the India gate to commemorate Indian soldiers martyred in the war of the liberation of Bangladesh in December 1971. It was inaugurated by the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on 26 January 1972, the twenty-third Indian Republic Day.