Coldplay charms India in anti-poverty concert

Indian Bollywood actress Sonam Kapoor poses on the red carpet at the 2016 'Global Citizen Festival India' to end extreme poverty by 2030 in Mumbai on Saturday. (AFP)

MUMBAI: Nearly 80,000 people in India’s financial capital Mumbai attended the Global Citizen Festival headlined by British rock band Coldplay Saturday as part of an anti-poverty campaign.
Top global megastars including rap megastar Jay Z, pop singer Demi Lovato and British band The Vamps performed at the event, alongside Bollywood names including superstar Shah Rukh Khan.
The Global Citizen Festival is an annual music concert established in 2012 which is part of a broader campaign to end extreme poverty by 2030. Coldplay’s Chris Martin is the concert’s creative director.
Concertgoers formed long queues early in the day outside the venue, causing major traffic congestion in Mumbai’s already-congested business district. Martin ended the concert by singing India’s national anthem ‘Vande Mataram’ (Mother, I salute thee) with help from India’s Oscar-winning music director A.R Rahman.
Nearly 80 percent of tickets to the event were given away to people who support organizer Global Poverty Project’s campaigns, including improving sanitation, gender equality, and education in India.
The event was attended by Hindi screen legend Amitabh Bachchan and Nelson Mandela’s grandson Kweku Mandela.
In a televised address, India’s Prime minister Narendra Modi, who had appeared at the festival in 2014, quoted lines from Bob Dylan’s famous songs to refer to changing political climate in the South Asian country. But he kept his comments brief, saying “I know that I stand between you and Coldplay,” but heaped praise on India’s young population, saying they “bring an energy and idealism that is unparalleled.”