Gayatri Devi’s grandson Devraj at the City Palace on Wednesday. (Surendra Jain Paras)

Jaipur, July 29: For the past 45 years, Rajmata Gayatri Devi had been spending her summers in London, away from the scorching heat of Rajasthan. This year too she flew to the place of her birth where she usually stays from May to September. But unusually, the Rajmata yearned to return to her hometown sooner than in previous years.

On July 17, the 90-year-old was flown back in an air ambulance, costing Rs 15 lakh, as she was feeling lonely and wanted to be in Jaipur, her home for 70 years.

She was suffering from a stomach ailment and was admitted to Santokhba Durlabhji Hospital, where she was treated for intestine and gastric disorder. Discharged a few days ago, she was readmitted yesterday for chest infection.

“She had recovered from her gastrointestinal problems but yesterday she was detected with a lung infection. Her condition deteriorated this morning and she breathed her last around 1600 hours,” said Dr Subhash Kala of the hospital.

The city had lost its beloved “Queen Mother”. Bengal had lost a daughter — she was born in 1919 to Maharaja Jitendra Narayan and Maharani Indira Devi of the Koch dynasty of Cooch Behar. And India had lost one of its most glamorous, wealthy and progressive royals.

Gayatri Devi’s death came a day after another celebrated beauty of her time, Leela Naidu, died. Sometime in the sixties, fashion magazine Vogue had named the two as among the world’s 10 most beautiful women.

Gayatri Devi’s life was the stuff fairy tales are made of: a carefree childhood in the sprawling Cooch Behar palace; a panther kill when she was 12; trips with her mother to Europe; a secret six-year courtship with a dashing polo player whom she called Jai, but who happened to be the Maharaja of Jaipur, Sawai Mansingh II; her marriage and her entrance into the famed City Palace of Jaipur, where she had to adjust to unfamiliar customs and to life with the Maharaja’s two other wives.

The Jaipur royalty led a life of extravagance in keeping with their status of being among India’s wealthiest: summers on the Continent, hunting trips, children educated in the best schools of Europe, a stream of dignitaries calling on them.

But the Maharaja’s liberating influence, combined with Gayatri Devi’s own strong character, took her well beyond the traditionally limited activities of a Maharani.

She founded a school for girls, promoted the dying art of blue pottery and entered politics, where she achieved huge success. She joined the Swatantra Party, founded by C. Rajagopalachari, and won three successive Lok Sabha elections from Jaipur — in 1962, 1967 and 1971.

The 1962 win found her a place in the Guinness records for the highest percentage of votes polled for a candidate in a parliamentary election. Then US President John F. Kennedy even introduced her as “the woman with (the) most staggering majority that anyone has ever earned in an election”.

However, her opposition to the Congress earned her the wrath of Indira Gandhi, who, in 1971, withdrew the privy purse. The Rajmata even had to spend five months in Delhi’s Tihar Jail during Emergency, allegedly for flouting tax laws.

She retired from politics after that, but continued to work for social causes.

She often said Jaipur was transforming, but not for the better. In 2008, she protested on the pavement with slum dwellers against unauthorised constructions, which, she said, were ruining the city’s skyline.

She also complained about the rampant tree felling by the land mafia.

These public appearances notwithstanding, the Rajmata led a largely secluded life, ensconced in her spacious and beautiful residence, Lily Pool, on the Rambagh Palace estate. She owned a stud farm, liked riding and playing tennis and squash, and tending to her fleet of vintage cars — a Bentley being her favourite.

She had been living alone since her husband died in 1970 while playing polo. She lived apart from her stepson, the present Maharaja, Brigadier Bhawani Singh, and spent English summers coinciding with the racing season in London, where she owned properties in Ascot and a town house in Mayfair.

Her loneliness grew when her only son Jagat Singh, a gifted photographer who stayed mostly in Europe, passed away in 1997 in London.