A viral image of Dalai Lama worshipping a Shiva linga with other monks around him is doing the rounds on social media. Social Media users have shared the photo claiming that Dalai Lama is renouncing his fake Buddhism while worshipping Lord Shiva.

A Facebook user posted the viral picture with a caption: (English translation: Real Buddhist Devadidev performing Jalabhishek to Mahadev and here swearing not to believe in fake Buddhist God)

You can check the post here.

NewsMobile fact-checked the viral picture, and found it to be misleading.

If Dalai Lama the highest spiritual leader of Tibet would have made any such claims, it would have made headlines all over the news. But our search to find out accuracy of the viral claim yielded no results.

However, running a Reverse Image Search of the viral image, we found a Pinterest picture, titled: Buddhist Spiritual Leader Dalai Lama paying tributes at Gupt Ganga Shiv Temple on Tuesday. Jammu Kashmir Latest News | Tourism | Breaking News J&K. The description as well as the title of the image indicate that it was taken during Dalai Lamas visit to Gupt Ganga Shiv Temple in J&K.

Conducting a Google Keyword Search to know more about his visit, we traced a YouTube video, dated July 19, 2012, on a channel Degeyang. The video, titled: The Dalai Lama Visits Shiv Temple Rainawari, shows Dalai Lama praying to Lord Shiva and offering milk to the Shiva linga.

Also, a news article in NDTV Online, titled: Dalai Lama visits religious sites in Srinagar, prays for peace, dated July 17, 2012, clarifies his motive behind the temple visit. The article informs that Dalai Lama not only visited a Hindu temple, but various religious sites of different faiths in Srinagar to pray for peace in the state and in the world. Some of the religious places that he visited were the Hazratbal shrine, the Gupt Ganga Shiv temple, and Gurudwara Chatti Padshahi.

We went through the entire article, but could not find any news of him renouncing Buddhism. Another article, titled: Dalai Lama Visits Religious Places, on the official website of Dalai Lama, dated July 18, 2012, corroborates the facts in the NDTV report.

We could not find a single credible source of information that would back the claim that Dalai Lama renounced his fake Buddhism while praying to Lord Shiva.

Therefore, we can conclusively say that the viral claims of Dalai Lama renouncing his fake Buddhism is misleading.

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Fact Check: Did Dalai Lama Swear to Renounce Buddhism While Praying to Lord Shiva? Heres the Truth - Newsmobile