President Droupadi Murmu conferred Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian award, on Bharatiya Janata Party veteran Lal Krishna Advani at his residence in Delhi recently. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, vice president Jagdeep Dhankar and former vice president M Venkaiah Naidu were also present on the occasion. After the ceremony, Lighthouse Journalism found an image being widely circulated where President Droupadi Murmu was seen standing while LK Advani and Prime Minister Narendra Modi were seen sitting. The allegation was that it was a serious breach of protocol. During the investigation we found the claims to be misleading.
Claim:
X user With Love, Bihar shared the image with a viral claim.
Check the archive version of the post.
Other users too are sharing the same claim.
Investigation:
We started our investigation by a basic Google keyword search and we found several news reports about LK Advani being conferred Bharat Ratna award.
We also found a news report on Mirror Now about the controversy.
We then checked the X handle of ‘President of India’.
In one picture posted on the handle, the president was seen sitting after conferring the Bharat Ratna.
We found a news report on the website of The Hindu, which said: Experts, however, are saying that Mr. Modi was just following the Rashtrapati Bhavan’s protocol. Ashok Malik, former press secretary to former President Ramnath Kovind, said on X that Rashtrapati Bhavan protocol has the President and recipient both standing, while other guests — including the Vice-President and Prime Minister — are seated. “If the recipient is elderly or indisposed he/she may stay seated. This event did not take place in Rashtrapati Bhavan, but obviously the usual protocol was followed,” he said.
We also found a video on the YouTube channel of Narendra Modi where others along with PM Modi were also seen sitting.
There was a tweet by Ashok Malik on the same.
Conclusion: Claims of protocol violation in seating position during award of Bharat Ratna to L K Advani are misleading. President Droupadi Murmu was seen sitting after the Bharat Ratna was conferred.
