Republic Day Parade
(DELHI)
The largest democracy of the world marks it’s Republic Day
with a grand parade. This, largest and most important parade
takes place on the 26th of January every year at Rajpath.
Attended by the top political and military brass, the parade
showcases India’s defense capability and it’s cultural and
social heritage.
Thousands of people swarm the parade to join the
celebrations. While it’s very important to Indians, the parade
is attended by all the ambassadors to India, making it an
internationally important event for India. Telecasted on the
National television and broadcast on the National radio, the
parade is the most awaited event of the year. Every year, the
parade is held from President’s House along the Rajpath till
India Gate.
With such grandeur it is of high importance that the 2.1
km stretch of Rajpath has the best audio for the spectators.
The 1, Signal Unit of the Indian Army takes care of the
Public Address (PA) System. The success of the show not
just depends on how well the contingents and tableaux
perform, it also depends on how well the speech is delivered
to the spectators. And this, brought a lot of challenges to the
organizers.
Till now, the 1, Signal Unit was using a rudimentary setup
to transmit audio across the venue, which consisted of
analog audio lines from one rack location to another. While
it is a cumbersome task logistically, it also involved high
noise and unavailability risk. The high system availability
requirement of the event brings one more challenge, to have
hot standby amplifier backup. Which means that a standby
amplifier will take over in case any primary amplifier fails.
The organizers were using age old manual switchovers to
achieve this.
When the Indian Army decided to revamp the system,
Harman was chosen after a tough competition with various
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other brands. To connect 5 different rack locations, Harman
offered a system with Dante and CobraNet backbone for
transmission of audio. Soundcraft mixers were provided
for the operators while Digital Signal Processors by BSS
were provided for audio transmission. Crown DriveCore
Install Network Amplifiers were used for amplification. The
amplifiers were chosen for a unique dual input with priority
router feature. The amplifiers get both digital and analog
input which is processed by priority router onboard. In
case the digital input fails, the analog inputs get routed. The
amplifiers also have onboard DSP with latency, crossover,
band pass filters, input/output EQ, limiter and various
other monitoring features. The amplifier line switching is
achieved by Crown CT8SHO amplifier line switcher. Using
the CT8SHO Switchers, the amplifier switching is attained
without any human intervention. Each PA zone at Rajpath is
fed by two different amplifiers which provide redundancy for
loudspeaker line connectivity.
The loudspeakers for the event were chosen after high
scrutiny by the Signal Unit. The Loudspeakers needed to
reproduce the speech in best possible way and needed to
be suitable for music as well. While according to general
wisdom, the cabinet type loudspeaker fits the requirement,
they are hindrance to the line of sight and doesn’t have any
aesthetic appeal, which is not acceptable for an event of such
splendor. To get a balance of both, the Indian Army chose the
JBL CBT 70J-1 with CBT 70JE-1 extension. The column type
construction of the loudspeaker blends it with the existing
architecture. The system control and monitoring is achieved
using the HiQnet Audio Architect, on which the custom
panels provide the command of complete system on a single
screen for the operator.
The Republic Day, for the first time, used an end-to-end
digital system and had the best sound for the most awaited
event of the year.