The death of veteran actor Shashi Kapoor on Monday was mourned by millions and it was dubbed the end of an era, undoubtedly. The actor’s demise was covered globally but BBC attracted ire of many for an embarrassing goof-up.

Actor Shashi Kapoor died aged 79, but the tribute to the star on the broadcaster’s flagship news programme mistakenly  used footage of Amitabh Bachchan and Rishi Kapoor.

It comes just days after BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour mixed up a Japanese doctor and a Vietnamese film maker.

But neither of the men shown were Kapoor — one was his nephew Rishi and the other was actor Amitabh Bachchan, a BBC report accepted on Tuesday.

The programme’s editor Paul Royall apologised on Twitter on Tuesday for the mistake hours after the bulletin was aired.

“BBC News at Ten is very sorry wrong images were used to mark the death of Shashi Kapoor. Not our usual standards and I apologise for any upset.”

But the error was criticised by some of the corporation’s own stars on social media. Adil Ray, the creator and co-writer of BBC One’s Citizen Khan, tweeted: “Someone at the BBC thought the brown person in this VT is the same person.

“Worse still, neither of them are the deceased actor Huw refers to. It’s poor when it would have taken them seconds to verify. Not enough care.”

Aasmah Mir, who presents Saturday Live on BBC Radio 4, said she was “really annoyed” by the error.

In a statement, the BBC said: “BBC News at Ten is very sorry the wrong images were used to mark the death of Shashi Kapoor. The piece did not meet its usual standards and the programme has apologised for any upset.”

An Indian television news channel too mistakenly tweeted the demise of Congress politician Shashi Tharoor, while reporting on Kapoor’s death on Monday. They too, later apologised.

The video of the clip being broadcast on television has gone viral on social media with many people now seeking an apology from the news organisation for the gaffe, which the channel later did.

WATCH

This is how Twitter users reacted to the goof-up