Aishwarya Rai Bachchan in Melbourne to hoist the Indian national flag at the iconic Federation Square

On Wednesday late night, we saw Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and her daughter Aaradhya’s adorable pictures of saying goodbye to Abhishek Bachchan at the international airport before they flew off to Melbourne. The actress is a special guest at the Indian Film Festival of Melbourne (IFFM) 2017, is attending the opening weekend of this year’s festival (August 10-22) and also will be the first Indian woman to hoist the Indian national flag at the iconic Federation Square building on August 12 to mark the 70th Indian Independence Day celebrations at the annual flag hoisting ceremony.

Aishwarya will also walk the red carpet as a special guest at the star-studded awards night held on August 11 at Melbourne’s Recital Centre and is expected to win an award for her acting in Sarabjit. On Thursday night the actress was seen with the Premier of Victoria, Honourable Daniel Andrews MP and IFFM Festival Director Mitu Bhowmick-Lange. At the event the minister spoke to her about her being the first Indian woman to hoist the Indian flag in Australia and spoke about Indian films and its growing importance in a country like Australia.

It’s also a nostalgic trip for Aishwarya as she has been in Melbourne before. She has performed earlier at the closing ceremony of the Commonwealth Games with Rani Mukerji Chopra and Saif Ali Khan. However it’s the actress’s first visit with her daughter Aaradhya and the two are expected to visit some hot spots in Melbourne on their visit here this time.

Vaibhav Choudhary