Indian brides ready to welcome Barack Obama

NEW DELHI - Women dressed in bridal finery, wearing lehengas and saris, will Sunday welcome the Obamas in a traditionally Indian manner with flowers as strains of the shehnai resound in the background at the ITC Maurya where the US First Couple will stay till Tuesday morning.

“The ‘Brides of India’ welcome is a grand affair,” a source said.

The lobby of the hotel has been elegantly decorated with flower arrangements. The area outside the hotel has been greened with saplings, flowering plants and a new green carpet of grass by the civic agencies and the ITC Maurya.

“The plantation drive has been an ongoing project by the ITC Maurya for several years now. We have been planting new trees and greened stretches of Dhaula Kuan, where the hotel is located, for several years,” said the source.

The presidential fare at the hotel, the subject of much speculation, will be an elaborate choice of Indian and western food. “He can have his pick,” the source said.

The hotel, however, chose to remain silent on the Obama platter. “We can’t disclose anything,” a spokesperson said though sources said “a special plate named after Obama is likely”.

Security is stringent. “It is multi-tiered because the hotel has been taken over by the president’s security team. Guests are being frisked and entry of visitors has been controlled,” the source said.

US President Barack Obama and his entourage landed in the capital at around 3.30 p.m. when his Air Force One plane touched down at the Delhi airport.