Growing up a modern Indian royal is ‘like Downton Abbey’, says Princess Akshita of Mayurbhanj, who restored Belgadia Palace as a boutique hotel to keep history alive

Feb 3 , 2022

Princess Akshita grew up in a 100-year-old British bungalow in Kolkata. Photo: Princess Akshita

The descendant of India’s Bhanja dynasty and Nepal’s royal family says her 100-year old British bungalow was a world away from the ‘swanky apartments’ of her friends

The princess and older sister Mrinalika ensured the survival of the family’s 200-year-old Belgadia Palace by restoring it as a boutique hotel anyone can stay in

Princess Akshita M Bhanj Deo says growing up royal in India among “dilapidated” palaces was similar to how Downton Abbey characters constantly try to ensure the survival of their family home.

Akshita traces her royal lineage through the Bhanja dynasty and her grandmother, daughter of the late King Tribhuvan of Nepal. She returned to her home state of Orissa in 2016, after graduating from New York’s Bard College, and started working with her older sister Princess Mrinalika Bhanj Deo on converting Belgadia Palace, a 200-year-old family estate, into a boutique hotel.

But most of the palaces built and run by her ancestors were given up when India became independent from Britain in 1947, the same time Indian royals lost their official powers, she said.

Princess Akshita says her family homes were like “white elephants”. Photo: Courtesy of Princess Akshita

Searching for ways to maintain the palaces, forts and stately homes her family managed to keep hold of is something Akshita saw her grandparents and parents deal with growing up.

“My parents grew up in a generation where you just don’t talk about it,” she said. “It’s not as pretty as it looks. These palaces were massive white elephants. Some of them are dilapidated, or at different stages of restoration.”

Assumptions she grew up living like a typical Disney princess are far from the truth, Akshita said. If anything, she said her childhood shares parallels with the struggles faced by the Crawley family in Downton Abbey.

“My reality was so much further than that,” she said of princesses like Cinderella. “We lived in this really old, 100-year-old British bungalow in Kolkata. If you’ve seen Downton Abbey, I mean these houses always have wear and tear and restoration needed.”

“When you see what your grandmother was like and then you see like the way your children are going to grow up and it’s not gonna be these stately houses with 100 staff and a lot of decorum. That just won’t work,” she said. “We don’t have the means to and that’s the same problem they have.”

Princess Akshita strikes a pose. Photo: @indian_prince_princess/Instagram

Realising how much work goes into the survival of their family homes also hit her when she saw friends living in “really swanky” modern apartments while growing up.