Claim

In 1999 Atal Bihari Vajpayee travelled to Lahore by bus with good intentions, and Pakistan's army chief Pervez Musharraf did not even salute the Indian Prime Minister.

“1999 में अटल बिहारी वाजपेयी ने नेक इरादों से बस से लाहौर का दौरा किया... उनके सेना प्रमुख परवेस मुशराव ने भारतीय प्रधानमंत्री को सलाम तक नहीं किया।”

Rationale

The first half of the claim is accurate: Vajpayee did travel to Lahore by the inaugural Delhi-Lahore bus on 19-20 February 1999 as a peace overture, signing the Lahore Declaration. The second half overstates a contested episode. It is well documented that Musharraf and the other two service chiefs snubbed Vajpayee by boycotting the Wagah welcome ceremony, which contemporary Indian reporting rendered as a 'refusal to salute.' However, the chiefs did attend the Governor's House reception, and Musharraf himself later stated on record that he saluted Vajpayee at the official state event, skipping only the political Minar-e-Pakistan function. No fact-checker or primary source establishes definitively that Musharraf never saluted the Indian PM; the anchor presents a disputed anecdote as settled fact while the underlying snub (the boycott) was real.

Evidence

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lahore_Declaration Confirms Vajpayee's February 1999 bus journey to Lahore and records that Pakistan's military chiefs — army chief Gen. Pervez Musharraf, air chief PQ Mehdi and naval chief Adm. Fasih Bokhari — boycotted the reception for Vajpayee, though Pakistan Army units did give him a guard of honour at Wagah. ✓ reachable · archived
• https://www.theweek.in/news/world/2019/12/18/pervez-musharrafs-commando-style-of-politics.html Reports the contemporary 'hullabaloo' over Musharraf's alleged refusal to salute Vajpayee, but notes Musharraf later clarified that he did salute the visiting PM at the official state event and skipped only the Minar-e-Pakistan ceremony because it was a political event. ✓ reachable · archived
• https://theprint.in/past-forward/the-bus-ride-that-almost-helped-vajpayee-sharif-rewrite-history-of-south-asia/255250/ Retrospective on the February 19-20, 1999 Delhi-Lahore bus diplomacy; recounts that the three Pakistani service chiefs were absent from the border welcome but were present at the Governor's House, and that the military (then planning Kargil) was cold to the peace initiative. ✗ unreachable · HTTP 403
• https://www.stimson.org/1999/lahore-summit/ Independent record of the Lahore Summit of February 1999, confirming Vajpayee's inaugural bus trip and the signing of the Lahore Declaration. ✗ unreachable · HTTP 403