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After weeks of anticipation and a morning of wall-to-wall build-up on local television networks, which covered the event live, India's "people's car" rolled on stage to the epic strains of Richard Strauss's Also Sprach Zarathustra, with Ratan Tata, the chairman of Tata Motors, at the wheel.
You could almost hear the cheer going up across India - and you couldn't hear yourself think in the auditorium - as waiting journalists, members of the public and the minister of commerce, Kamal Nath, broke into spontaneous and euphoric applause.
Tata (below), suave and 70, appeared to have a lump in his throat as he announced the realisation of a dream that has taken more than four years and 500 engineers to bring to reality.
This was more than just the launch of a car, he said: it was the jumping-off point for an ideal that its designers hope will revolutionise the lives of millions of Indians, most of whom live in rural areas many miles from the nearest bus stop.
