"My wish is that our friendship blossoms forever, and we work together till our last breath," Amit said; an overwhelmed Prashant responded by pulling Amit into the kind of hug that drives the breath out of you.

Overall, it was intriguing to see that the crowds cheered louder, far more enthusiastically, for two young men who had captured the national imagination than they did for headline performers like Anu Malik, Sukhvinder Singh, Alisha Chinai and Udit Narayan.