In Holland, which is 76 times smaller than India, the media felt somewhat let down by their Indian counterparts. While the queen’s visit was featured in just a few newspaper photographs in Delhi, there were daily specials on the Indian odyssey in the Dutch media. Several Dutch newspapers highlighted minister for commerce and industry Kamal Nath’s dismay — expressed to a visiting Dutch business delegation — over a 2005 report of the Dutch-Indian Clean Clothes Campaign, alleging that the Indian firm, Fibres and Fabrics International Ltd, had violated labour norms by allowing child labour.

As Queen Beatrix’s visit to Delhi wound down, the mystery of the missing coverage in the local media remained. Was the Indian media bored with such state visits or was it because the Dutch authorities themselves were not keen on coverage? When an Express correspondent tried to cover the Deepalaya visit, Dutch embassy officials refused entry citing security reasons — because security clearance, as the embassy understood it, required more time than was available in this request. And that perhaps provides a clue to why the Indian media’s reception to Queen Beatrix was so tepid.