NEW DELHI: India is celebrating its 71st Republic Day on Sunday marking it with grand celebrations in the national capital and all across the nation.

Republic Day is celebrated to honor the historic date when the country completed its transition towards becoming an independent republic after its constitution came into effect.

With the 71st Republic Day celebrations set to begin in the national capital shortly, the entire national capital has been put under a multi-layered, ground-to-air security cover with thousands of armed personnel keeping a tight vigil over it, including the celebration venue Rajpath.

Meanwhile, in an address to the nation on the eve of Republic Day, India President Ram Nath Kovind referred said that though legislature, executive and judiciary were the three organs of a modern state and yet people comprise the state on the ground and have the real power to decide the country’s collective future.

President Kovind said the Constitution came into effect on January 26 seven decades ago but the date had acquired special significance even before that.

Noting that the modern state comprises the three organs – legislature, executive and judiciary, he said they are necessarily interlinked and interdependent.

(With input from agencies)