KOCHI, India (AFP) ― Britain’s Prince Charles turned 65 while travelling in India on Thursday and his staff teased him with a cake in the shape of a free bus pass, which he can now claim as a pensioner.

The heir apparent, Queen Elizabeth II’s eldest son, was celebrating at the end of a nine-day trip to India, before he flew to Sri Lanka to open a meeting of leaders from the Commonwealth bloc.

Princes Charles’s staff ordered the cake from his luxury hotel in the southern Indian port city of Kochi in the shape of a bus pass, granted to those over 65 in Britain to give them unlimited free travel.

With rain disrupting his schedule, Charles and his wife Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall, visited an old Jewish area, a church and a former colonial palace in Kochi in the southern state of Kerala.

On his arrival in Colombo, Charles and Camilla were greeted by traditional drummers and dancers on the red carpet and signed a visitors’ book at the airport, after chatting to a reception committee of local dignatories.

The prince and his wife on Wednesday enjoyed a rest day on their Indian trip, giving them time for private celebrations.

Following a low-key visit largely unremarked upon in the Indian media, the future king will be thrown into the limelight on Friday when he takes the queen’s place at the Commonwealth heads of government summit.

The queen, 87, has only missed one such summit since coming to the throne in 1952, signalling an increase in the amount of power being handed to the prince.

He will meet Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse, who is under scrutiny from the international community over alleged war crimes committed by the country’s military against ethnic Tamil rebels.

As well as a bus pass, the prince is now entitled to 110.15 pounds ($176.70) per week state pension. But he will donate the money to a charity for the elderly, in keeping with his role as a philanthropist.

Charles is set to be the oldest-ever person to ascend the British throne ― and with the queen still in apparently good health, it could be some time yet.