'She led a life of novelistic dimensions, part E.M. Forster, part Jackie Collins. Born into royalty and married to royalty, she had almost unimaginable wealth, and she spent her early life, as a girl and a young woman, in palaces in India and estates in England.

'Routinely referred to as one of the world's most beautiful women - Vogue magazine once described her as 'a dream in sari and jewels' - she was a cosmopolite with a scrutinized wardrobe, a frequenter of elegant European resorts,' the Times noted.

The obituary quotes from a New York Times Magazine report of 1966. Referring to a government briefing Gayatri Devi attended, the report noted: 'She was dressed in a turquoise-blue chiffon sari with silver sequins sparkling like stars on a moonless night. She looked around with her large almond eyes. Everyone stood up. As Hillaire Belloc once described someone, 'her face was like the king's command when all the swords are drawn'.'