France's former first lady en route to India after split

Hollande declared his relationship with Trierweiler over on Saturday.

A day after parting ways with President Francois Hollande, France's former first lady discreetly left Paris for India on Sunday to support a nonprofit organization, CNN affiliate BFMTV reported.

Valerie Trierweiler boarded an Air France flight to Mumbai with an entourage that included her friend actress Charlotte Valandrey, BFMTV reported from the French capital's Charles de Gaulle Airport.

Valandrey told BFMTV that Trierweiler "was very happy to leave for that mission to save children in India. ... She is a strong woman with a heart ... someone who can be counted on and who is engaged in a humanitarian cause."

The former first lady is lending her support to the Action Against Hunger charity in India, in a trip that has been in the works for months. While there, her schedule will include attending a charity gala dinner, Action Against Hunger said on its website.

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It will be her first public appearance since a media storm over Hollande's alleged affair with an actress erupted this month.

Goodbye message

Hollande declared his relationship with Trierweiler over on Saturday.

"I wish to make it known that I have ended my shared life (partnership) with Valerie Trierweiler," Hollande told the Agence France-Presse news agency.

Trierweiler sent a goodbye message Saturday via Twitter to the staff at the presidential palace.

"All my gratitude goes to the extraordinary people at the Elysee. I will never forget the devotion or emotion at the time of leaving," she wrote.

Hollande's private life has been the subject of global headlines since the French magazine Closer claimed this month he'd been having an affair with actress Julie Gayet for two years.

Speculation about the split swirled Saturday after a French national weekly reported Hollande was expected to announce his separation from Trierweiler later in the day.

But the French presidency initially denied the report that an announcement would be made. "It is a rumor that circulated on the Internet today. There is absolutely no confirmation of the publication of a statement today," the palace press officer told CNN.