Amitabh Bachchan to sing national anthem in India-Pakistan game on March 19

Music is set to add more zest to the high-voltage India-Pakistan game as Legendary Indian actor Amitabh Bachchan and Pakistani singer Shafqat Amanat Ali Khan will sing their country’s respective national anthems before the match at Kolkata’s Eden Gardens stadium on March 19th.

Bachchan has confirmed the development by retweeting a post in his official Twitter handle. The sources in the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) have stated that this arrangement was an effort by its president Sourav Ganguly.

Amitabh Bachan will sing India’s national anthem, while Shafqat Amanat Ali Khan will sing Pakistan’s national anthem,” an official from the Cricket Association of Bengal confirmed.

“The president was involved and the plan was on for a long time,” CAB sources said.

The match, which was shifted from the HPCA Stadium, Dharamsala to Eden Gardens, Kolkata has been in news ever since the fixtures of the ICC World T20 was announced. There was a huge debate over the Pakistan team security concerns at Dharamsala. All this torrid drama delayed the arrival of the Pakistan team who eventually landed in India couple of days before the commencement of the Super 10 stage.

All the controversy affected their preparation to some extent as they could play only one practice game ahead of the main tournament.

India begun its campaign against New Zealand today at the VCA Stadium, Nagpur whereas Pakistan will kickstart their World t20 journey against Bangladesh in 14th March in Eden gardens.

India maintains a clean sheet against their arch-rivals in the World Cup and is unbeaten against them. This time too, India begins as the potential winner of the contest considering their red-hot form in the recent time. But, Pakistan can also never be written out off completely. Their recent meeting at the Asia Cup T20 was a rousing low scoring affair. All these factors make a perfect recipe for a mouth watering campaign.