This Thursday, all roads in the state capital would lead to Gandhi Maidan. The much-awaited and talkedabout event — Bihar Divas, 2012 — is set to start at the historic ground on March 22 evening.

An array of stars, including Udit Narayan, Pandit Jasraj, Richa Sharma, Javed Akhtar and Kailash Kher, are set to perform at Gandhi Maidan and SK Memorial Hall during the three-day event. (See graphics)

Among the celebrity guests, Shatrughan Sinha, Sonakshi Sinha, Hema Malini, Manoj Bajpayee, Neetu Chandra, Shekhar Suman and Prakash Jha have confirmed their presence. The education department has also invited Amitabh Bachchan but has not received any confirmation from the actor yet.

“Hema Malini today confirmed her arrival for the centenary year celebrations,” said Yashwant Parashar, co-ordinator for Bihar Divas cultural programmes. The Dream Girl’s presence would certainly make chief minister Nitish Kumar very happy as he had personally invited the actress for the event during her recent visit to Patna.

The mega celebrations would begin on Wednesday with the release of Bihar Rajya Geet (state anthem) and Prarthana (state prayer) at Samvad Bhavan (CM secretariat) at 5pm. Sources said, the state anthem, Mere Bharat ke kanthhaar, has been written by city-based poet Satya Narayan and sung by playback singers Udit Narayan and Sadhana Sargam. The state prayer, Meri raftaar pe suraj ki kiran naaz kare, has been written by M.R. Chishti, an Urdu teacher from Muzaffarpur, and sung by Udit Narayan. Music for the anthem and the prayer has been composed by Bollywood’s renowned music composer duo Shiv-Hari (Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma and Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia).

“A Mumbai-based professional dance group is training 100 children from the state for past few days. These children would perform on the state anthem and the prayer song. Bihar Divas, 2012, will be inaugurated by chief minister Nitish Kumar on Thursday. He would also release several books and distribute prizes for the competitions organised by various state government departments in the past,” said Parashar.

The celebration of 100 years of statehood would also see participation by delegations from foreign countries. “Delegations comprising ambassadors, senior officers and few members of Parliament from Mauritius, Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname and Qatar are also coming to Patna to attend the Bihar Divas celebrations,” said Parashar.