Indian paddlers A Sharath Kamal and Manika Batra decided against attending the ceremony as they have their opening match the following day.
Legendary boxer Mary Kom and hockey captain Manpreet Singh who were the flag bearers led out India's contingent at the Tokyo Olympics Games 2020 at Japan National Stadium.
Indian paddlers Sharath Kamal and Manika Batra decided against attending the ceremony as they have their opening match the following day.
The sky over the National Stadium in Tokyo exploded in indigo and white as fireworks marked the start of the opening ceremony for the Olympics on Friday, celebrating the world's best athletes set to compete amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Postponed for a year, organisers were forced to take the unprecedented step of holding the Games without fans as the novel coronavirus is on the rise again, taking lives around the world.
Even the opening ceremony, normally a star-studded display teeming with celebrities was eerily silent, with fewer than 1,000 people in attendance, strict social distancing rules, and signs calling on the spectators to "be quiet around the venue."
The opening video featured at the stadium recapped Japan's path to the Games and the challenges the world has faced since the selection of the Japanese capital as host in 2013.
It showed how in 2020 the coronavirus struck, with lockdowns forcing the unprecedented postponement only four months before the Games were supposed to open, setting off a roller-coaster period of uncertainty and preparations in isolation for the athletes.
Some of them are expected to use the ceremony to make statements about equality and justice and several nations will be represented by a man and a woman after the organisers changed their rules to allow two flagbearers.
Shortly before the fireworks, the opening video turned into the live-action shot of the stadium where a lone female athlete placed her hand on the ground over a single seed.
She then slowly stood up with her shadow stretching out in the shape of a seedling, underscoring the Games' theme of rebirth after the pandemic as well as Japan's reconstruction after the 2011 disasters.
About 11,000 athletes from 204 national Olympic committees are expected, along with a team of refugee athletes competing under the Olympic flag.
(Inputs from Reuters)
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