The Indian soldiers paraded down the 1.5-km stretch of Champs Elysees, along with French soldiers to the sound of Indian martial music.
In a rare honour for India, prime minister Manmohan Singh was today the chief guest of Honour at the French National Day celebrations witnessing an impressive parade in which a contingent of Indian soldiers also marched to the soul stirring music of Saare Jahan Se Achchha.
Singh became the first Indian leader to be the chief guest at the French celebrations, reflecting the closeness of ties between the two countries.
Sarkozy was the chief guest at the Republic Day last year and his invitation to Singh is a reciprocatory gesture.
France does not have a custom of inviting foreign heads of government or state to be the chief guest and only on few occasions is this honour bestowed on foreign leaders.
The event, during which the military parade opened with a detachment of 400 soldiers from the three defence services of India, bore a striking resemblance to the Republic Day celebrations in Delhi.
The Indian soldiers paraded down the 1.5-km stretch of Champs Elysees, along with French soldiers to the sound of Indian martial music played by a 90-member military band.
Maratha Regiment, one of the oldest infantry regiments of Indian army created in 1768 and which was deployed in Europe during the Second World War during the Italian campaign, was part of the parade.
The soldiers participated to the tunes of Sare Jahan Se Achchha and Kadam Kadam Badhaye Jaa.
While the army band played Bhopal, Hanste Lusai and Veer Sipahi to quick march, the Navy marched impressively to the tunes of Jai Bharati and INS Vikrant.
The Air Force band was greeted lustily by the parade watchers as they did a quick march. The event also witnessed an impressive fly past.
The Indian contingent's participation at the parade marked the commemoration of Indian army's association with its French counterpart during the two World Wars.
Under the British command, Indian soldiers along with the French forces, as part of two Allied Divisions, fought Germans in the northern French town of Neuve-Chapelle in March 1915.
Bastille Day, as the French National Day is called, commemorates the storming of the Bastille prison by the people, which took place on July 14, 1789 and marked the beginning of the French Revolution.
The Bastille prison symbolised absolute and arbitrary power of Louis XVI's ancient regime. With the capture of Bastille, people sent out a strong signal that the King's power was no longer absolute.
Though only seven prisoners were lodged in Bastille when it was taken over, the event became a symbol of liberty and the fight against oppression for all French citizens and marked the end of absolute monarchy and emergence of a sovereign nation and subsequently the creation of a Republic in 1792.
Bastille Day was declared as a French national holiday on July 6, 1880, on the recommendation of socialist politician Benjamin Raspail.
At this year's celebrations, Cambodian president Hun Sen, who is on a bilateral visit to France, is also the Guest of Honour along with German president Horst Kochler.
After the parade, Singh and Sarkozy had a 'working' lunch discussing ways to meet the bilateral trade target of 12 billion Euros in the face of the global economic crisis.
The bilateral trade, which had witnessed a considerable upward trend over the last several years, saw no increase last year because of the global meltdown. The bilateral commerce this year is expected to pick up again.
The prime minister's visit takes place at a time when the two countries are at an advanced stage of negotiations for setting up of two nuclear power plants in Maharashtra through a joint venture in pursuance to a framework agreement in civil nuclear energy field signed in September last year.
France had been at the forefront in furthering India's case for ending 34-year-old isolation in the nuclear field and strongly supported New Delhi in this regard at the Nuclear Suppliers Group meeting last August.
Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) and French Nuclear company Areva are preparing a contract under which two power plants of 1,650 MW each will be set up in Jaitapur in Maharashtra.
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