| The Rising is a story about the sepoy mutiny of 1857, which is widely regarded as the first Indian war of Independence. |
| The Prince then shook hands with Aamir Khan, who plays the role of Mangal Pandey -- one of the main mutineers and the chief protagonist in the movie. |
| The cheer on the sets was a clear sign that Indo-British ties had reached a level of maturity, with neither wanting to blame the other for the past. |
| The next halt on Prince Charles' agenda was a meeting with the captains of Indian industry at the Rooftop in The Oberoi. |
| Corporate India was in full attendance and the captains of industry had clearly taken time out for their brush with royalty. |
| They had gathered in clusters and the prince went around meeting the different groups. One of the groups had Tata group chairman Ratan Tata, Hindustan Lever Chairman M S Banga and the executive vice-chairman of RPG Enterprises, H V Goenka. |
| In another group, K M Sheth, the executive chairman of Great Eastern Shipping and Jimmy Sarbh, the head of P&O Australia Ports, rubbed shoulders. |
| Incidentally, GE Shipping is India's largest private sector shipping company, while P&O Australia is the largest foreign investor in the port sector. |
| Also present were deal makers like Uday Kodak, Ashok Wadhwa, Shitin Desai and one of India's best known chartered accountants -- Shailesh Haribhakti. The others present included Habil Khorakiwala, CMD of Wockhardt. The pharma company recently acquired its company in the UK -- CP Pharmaceuticals. |
| The other representatives of the pharma industry were Swati Piramal, the chief scientific officer of Nicholas Piramal, and Cipla chairman Y K Hamied. |
| Thermax promoter Anu Aga, Chitra Ramakrishnan, the deputy managing director of the National Stock Exchange, and Lalita Gupte, the joint managing director of ICICI Bank, met the prince together. |
| Providing a sharp contrast to the business suits was Bajaj Auto Chairman Rahul Bajaj who was decked in a kurta. The software lobby was represented by National Association of Sofware and Service Companies (Nasscom) chairman Kiran Karnik, Ashank Desai of Mastek and S Ramadorai, the CEO of software powerhouse Tata Consultancy Services, who had hosted a meeting earlier in the day under the aegis of the of the Nasscom. |
| Prince Charles had a word and a smile for everyone and mixed around. While it could not be ascertained what transpired in these exclusive meetings -- he made one thing clear in his formal speech -- his love of India. |
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