Roving Periscope: The British people to foot the 10.1 mn pounds bill for the Queen’s 10-day-long funeral

Virendra Pandit

New Delhi: The British royal family may have estimated assets of 24 billion pounds (over Rs. 2 lakh crore), but the financial burden of the burial of Queen Elizabeth II, who died last week, will be borne by the masses, already reeling under high inflation and unemployment.

According to a 2021 State of Hunger report, one in five Britons (nearly 1.45 crore people) is poor.

But that did not stop the United Kingdom of Great Britain from going all out to make the state funeral a once-in-a-century event, full of recreated pomp and glory of an empire that collapsed decades ago. The presence of VVIPs from former British colonies made it even more nostalgic.

After an hours-long funeral procession, they buried the Queen on Sunday next to her husband Prince Philip at Westminster Abbey in London, amid the presence of over 500 VVIPs, including Heads of State and Heads of Government, invited from all over the world.

Around 800,000 people attended the royal funeral procession.

The body of Queen Elizabeth II (1926-2022) was laid to rest on Monday beside that of her husband in a private ceremony in the King George VI memorial chapel at Windsor Castle. The country’s longest-serving monarch was taken on a 25-mile-long journey from Westminster Hall, where her body had lain in state for hundreds of thousands of people, some waiting in a queue for almost a day, to file past to pay their respects, The Guardian reported.

Some reports said the royal state funeral cost the British masses nearly 10.1 million pounds (Rs.90 crores) but neither the British government nor the royal family confirmed it.

Reports quoting a former royal security officer said the funeral cost was around USD 7.5 million (Rs. 60 crores), making Queen Elizabeth’s funeral the most expensive single-day event in British history.

In 2002, Queen Mother Elizabeth’s funeral cost 5.4 million pounds (Rs. 50 crores then, now equivalent to Rs. 81 crores).

In 1997, the funeral of Princess Diana, wife of then Prince Charles, and the eldest daughter-in-law of Queen Elizabeth II, cost between 3.5 and 5 million pounds (Rs. 30 to 45 crores).

They decided on the process of funeral and protocols under Operation London Bridge.

It was also pre-decided that the British people would bear all these expenses.

They earmarked most of these expenses for crowd management, policing, security of VVIPs, live telecast of the procession, and burial.