DHAKA: Prince Charles and his wife Camilla visited a military academy Thursday on the first full day of their Indian tour which began with garlands and a blessing beside the River Ganges.

The royal pair wore strings of jasmine and marigold flowers at a welcoming ceremony on Wednesday evening in the northern city of Rishikesh, where The Beatles learnt transcendental meditation in the Sixties.

Camilla and the heir to the British throne, wearing a grey suit, were blessed in front of a fire by their host, a heavily bearded and long-haired local holy man called Swami Chidanand Saraswatiji.

After a night in a spa hotel where rooms start at $500 a night, the royal pair continued Thursday to the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun, the capital of the northern state of Uttarakhand which was ravaged by flash floods in June.

Sporting military uniform, Charles watched training and shook hands with the cadets at the academy, which was set up in 1932 to prepare Indian recruits for Britain’s famed Sandhurst military school.

The Duchess of Cornwall, in a white dress with blue flowers, was treated to an equestrian show at the sprawling school, which also has a memorial to those who died in India’s struggle for independence from Britain, reports france24.com.

BDST: 2059HRS, NOV 07, 2013
RoR/RIS