LONDON, ENGLAND, UK (Reuters) – Prince William and his wife, the Duchess of Cambridge, opened their home on Wednesday (April 6) to Indian and Bhutanese people who live, work and study in the UK.
The royal couple opened up Kensington Palace to the guests, who included members of the academic, business and charity sectors, ahead of their six-day visit to India and Bhutan which begins on Sunday (April 10).
Kate wore in a floor length blue dress made by London-based Indian designer Saloni.
She and her husband met India’s High Commissioner to the UK, Navtej Sarna, model Neelam Gill and key figures from Prince Charles’ Britain Asian Trust.
Kate and William also played host to Bhutanese and Indian students enrolled on the Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s Chevening Scholarships Programme, the UK’s international awards scheme aimed at developing global leaders.
During their visit to India, the pair will visit the Taj Mahal, where William’s late mother Princess Diana took a solitary trip in 1992.
The image of Diana sitting on a bench during a solitary sight-seeing trip to the Taj Mahal, a monument to love, made front page news worldwide and was widely interpreted as symbolizing the irreparable state of her marriage to heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles.
William and Kate will also visit the Indian capital of New Delhi and their trip to Bhutan will put the secretive kingdom – which only starting accepting tourists in the 1970s – in the spotlight.
