Shankar plays for peace

Ravi Shankar performed with his daughter Anoushka

Musician Ravi Shankar has played at a concert for peace in India, following weeks of rioting between Hindus and Muslims.

More than 700 people have been killed in the western India state of Gujarat in the last two weeks following the riots.

Shankar, 82, who last month won a Grammy award for his album Full Circle, performed in front of a packed concert hall in New Delhi with people cramming the aisles, standing in the back and even sitting on the stage.

When Shankar walked onto the stage he received a standing ovation.

The star was accompanied by his daughter Anoushka Shankar and played for more than two hours.

Great acclaim

The pair performed on sitars, with two percussionists playing the tabla, or Indian drum.

Ravi Shankar has won great acclaim for more than 40 years for his skill with the sitar.

He acheived international fame for introducing Indian classical music to Western audiences, most famously through his collaboration in the sixties with the Beatles.

He began as a dancer but switched to the sitar at the age of 18.

Much of the calm spirituality evident in his music is rooted in his childhood in the holy city of Benares on the banks of River Ganges.

"There used to be so much entertainment, singing dancing, little dramas going on," he once said.

"You saw everything of life, from birth to death. It was really like magic."