On September 27, a Buddha Air flight from Kathmandu to Biratnagar experienced a landing gear deployment problem and made a safe emergency landing in Kathmandu.
After the safe landing, various individuals posted group photos on social media showing former king Gyanendra Shah and former queen Komal Shah with Buddha Air pilot Ang Gelu Sherpa and ground staff along with claims that the plane was able to avoid a major accident because the royal couple were on board.
On a Facebook page titled ‘Raja Gyanendra King Gyanendra (Rastrabhakta Raja),’ which has 60,000 members, a Facebook user Bishal Rajbhandari posted the group photo. The post reads, “The adage that god dwells where the king and queen are has been proven true. The king and queen were aboard today’s Buddha Air flight, so an accident was averted by the grace of Lord Pashupatinath.”
The post has received more than 3,500 responses and has been shared 498 times. Other Facebook users including Santosh Limbu and Aryan Ali have also shared the photo with similar claims.
Similar photos have been posted on another popular video-sharing platform TikTok. A post by TikTok user @astro_neeraj15 has earned over 22,000 likes and it has been shared over 59 times. Likewise, a post by @dahaltharka received 128,000 likes and 854 shares.
Fact check
South Asia Check ran a reverse image search on the internet but could not find the photos circulating on social media. But, a keyword search on Google took us to a similar image posted on the official Twitter handle of Buddha Air on December 17, 2018. The post reads, “Onboard with us today were the former king of Nepal, Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev, and Queen Komal Rajya Lakshmi Devi, on their flight to #Pokhara. #BuddhaAir #FlyWithUs.”
From the subjects and sartorial details in the Buddha Air photograph, it becomes clear that the photos currently being shared on social media were from the same occasion but taken from slightly different angles. So it is clear that nearly three-year-old photos were used to mislead the public into believing that the former royal couple were in the September 27 flight.
This post originally appeared on South Asia Check.
