List of chief guests at Delhi Republic Day parade

Since 1950, India has been hosting head of state or government of another country as the state guest of honor for Republic Day celebrations in New Delhi. During 1950–1954, Republic Day celebrations were organized at different venues (like Irwin Amphitheatre, Kingsway, Red Fort and Ramlila Maidan). It was only starting 1955 when the parade in its present form was organized at Rajpath.^[1] The guest country is chosen after a deliberation of strategic, economic and political interests. During 1950s–1970s, a number of Non-Aligned Movement and Eastern Bloc countries were hosted by India. In 1968 and 1974, India played host to two countries on the same Republic Day.

Countries invited as chief guests for the Republic Day parade. Yugoslavia (twice invited) has not been depicted in the map.

  6 times (France)

  5 times (United Kingdom)

  4 times (Bhutan, Indonesia, Soviet Union/Russia)

  Thrice (Brazil, Mauritius)

  Twice (Cambodia, Japan, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam)

  Once

  Never invited

By continent and geographic region, the invitations break up as follows:

Continent	Region	Invitations	Countries
Asia (37)	South Asia	12	Afghanistan, Bhutan (4 times), Maldives, Nepal (twice), Pakistan (twice), Sri Lanka (twice)
	Central Asia	1	Kazakhstan
	East Asia	4	China, Japan (twice), South Korea
	Southeast Asia	17	Brunei, Cambodia (twice), Indonesia (4 times), Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore (twice), Thailand (twice), Vietnam (twice)
	West Asia	3	Iran, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates
Africa (12)	North Africa	2	Algeria, Egypt
	West Africa	2	Nigeria (twice)
	Central Africa	1	Zaire
	Southern Africa	6	South Africa (twice), Mauritius (thrice), Zambia
	East Africa	1	Tanzania
Europe (25)	Eastern Europe	8	Bulgaria, Poland, Yugoslavia (twice), Soviet Union/Russia (4 times)
	Western Europe	17	Belgium, Denmark, France (6 times), Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, United Kingdom (5 times)
America (8)	Northern America	2	United States, Mexico
	Caribbean	1	Trinidad and Tobago
	South America	5	Argentina, Brazil (thrice), Peru
Oceania (1)	Australia	1	Australia

List of chief guests

Year	Portrait	Chief Guest	Country	Designation	Note		Host
1950		Sukarno[2]	Indonesia	President of Indonesia			Rajendra Prasad
1951		Tribhuvan Bir Bikram Shah[3]	Nepal	King of Nepal
1952	No information available
1953
1954		Jigme Dorji Wangchuck[4]	Bhutan	King of Bhutan			Rajendra Prasad
1955		Malik Ghulam Muhammad[5]	Pakistan	Governor-General of Pakistan	First guest for parade at Rajpath[6]
1956		Rab Butler	United Kingdom	Chancellor of the Exchequer	Two guests[7][note 1]
		Kōtarō Tanaka	Japan	Chief Justice of Japan
1957		Georgy Zhukov[9]	Soviet Union	Minister of Defence
1958		Ye Jianying[10]	China	Marshal of the People's Liberation Army
1959		Philip[11][12][13]	United Kingdom	Consort of Queen Elizabeth II	2nd invitation
1960		Kliment Voroshilov[14]	Soviet Union	Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet	2nd invitation
1961		Elizabeth II[15]	United Kingdom	Queen of the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms	3rd invitation[note 2]
1962		Viggo Kampmann[16]	Denmark	Prime Minister of Denmark	[note 3]
1963		Norodom Sihanouk[18]	Cambodia	King of Cambodia			Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
1964		Louis Mountbatten[8]	United Kingdom	Chief of the Defence Staff	4th invitation[note 1]
1965		Rana Abdul Hamid	Pakistan	Minister of Food and Agriculture	2nd invitation
1966	No information available[note 4]
1967		Mohammed Zahir Shah[20]	Afghanistan	King of Afghanistan	[note 5]		Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
1968		Alexei Kosygin	Soviet Union	Chairman of the Council of Ministers	3rd invitation	Two guests[23]	Zakir Husain
		Josip Broz Tito	Yugoslavia	President of Yugoslavia
1969		Todor Zhivkov[24]	Bulgaria	Prime Minister of Bulgaria
1970		Baudouin[25][26]	Belgium	King of Belgium	[note 6]		V. V. Giri
1971		Julius Nyerere[27]	Tanzania	President of Tanzania
1972		Seewoosagur Ramgoolam[28]	Mauritius	Prime Minister of Mauritius
1973		Mobutu Sese Seko[29]	Zaire	President of Zaire
1974		Josip Broz Tito	Yugoslavia	President of Yugoslavia	2nd invitation	Two guests[30]
		Sirimavo Bandaranaike	Sri Lanka	Prime Minister of Sri Lanka
1975		Kenneth Kaunda[31]	Zambia	President of Zambia			Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed
1976		Jacques Chirac[32]	France	Prime Minister of France
1977		Edward Gierek[33]	Poland	First Secretary of the Polish United Workers' Party
1978		Patrick Hillery[34]	Ireland	President of Ireland			Neelam Sanjiva Reddy
1979		Malcolm Fraser[35]	Australia	Prime Minister of Australia
1980		Valéry Giscard d'Estaing	France	President of France	2nd invitation
1981		Jose Lopez Portillo[36]	Mexico	President of Mexico
1982		Juan Carlos I[37]	Spain	King of Spain
1983		Shehu Shagari[38]	Nigeria	President of Nigeria			Zail Singh
1984		Jigme Singye Wangchuck[39]	Bhutan	King of Bhutan	2nd invitation
1985		Raúl Alfonsín[40]	Argentina	President of Argentina
1986		Andreas Papandreou[41]	Greece	Prime Minister of Greece
1987		Alan Garcia[42]	Peru	President of Peru
1988		J. R. Jayewardene[43]	Sri Lanka	President of Sri Lanka	2nd invitation		Ramaswamy Venkataraman
1989		Nguyễn Văn Linh[44]	Vietnam	General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam
1990		Anerood Jugnauth[45]	Mauritius	Prime Minister of Mauritius	2nd invitation
1991		Maumoon Abdul Gayoom[46]	Maldives	President of the Maldives
1992		Mário Soares[46]	Portugal	President of Portugal
1993		John Major[46]	United Kingdom	Prime Minister of United Kingdom	5th invitation		Shankar Dayal Sharma
1994		Goh Chok Tong[46]	Singapore	Prime Minister of Singapore
1995		Nelson Mandela[47]	South Africa	President of South Africa
1996		Fernando Henrique Cardoso[46]	Brazil	President of Brazil
1997		Basdeo Panday[46]	Trinidad and Tobago	Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago
1998		Jacques Chirac[46]	France	President of France	3rd invitation		K. R. Narayanan
1999		Birendra Bir Bikram Shah[46]	Nepal	King of Nepal	2nd invitation
2000		Olusegun Obasanjo[46]	Nigeria	President of Nigeria	2nd invitation
2001		Abdelaziz Bouteflika[46]	Algeria	President of Algeria
2002		Cassam Uteem[46]	Mauritius	President of Mauritius	3rd invitation
2003		Mohammed Khatami[46]	Iran	President of Iran			A. P. J. Abdul Kalam
2004		Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva[46]	Brazil	President of Brazil	2nd invitation
2005		Jigme Singye Wangchuck[46]	Bhutan	King of Bhutan	3rd invitation
2006		Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud[46]	Saudi Arabia	King of Saudi Arabia
2007		Vladimir Putin[46]	Russia	President of Russia	4th invitation
2008		Nicolas Sarkozy[46]	France	President of France	4th invitation		Pratibha Patil
2009		Nursultan Nazarbayev[46]	Kazakhstan	President of Kazakhstan
2010		Lee Myung Bak[48]	South Korea	President of South Korea
2011		Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono[49][50]	Indonesia	President of Indonesia	2nd invitation
2012		Yingluck Shinawatra[51]	Thailand	Prime Minister of Thailand
2013		Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck[52]	Bhutan	King of Bhutan	4th invitation		Pranab Mukherjee
2014		Shinzo Abe[53]	Japan	Prime Minister of Japan	2nd invitation
2015		Barack Obama[54]	United States	President of the United States
2016		François Hollande	France	President of France	5th invitation[55]
2017		Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan[56]	United Arab Emirates	Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi
2018		Hassanal Bolkiah	Brunei	Sultan of Brunei		Ten guests (heads of the ASEAN states)[57]	Ram Nath Kovind
		Hun Sen	Cambodia	Prime Minister of Cambodia	2nd invitation
		Joko Widodo	Indonesia	President of Indonesia	3rd invitation
		Thongloun Sisoulith	Laos	Prime Minister of Laos
		Najib Razak	Malaysia	Prime Minister of Malaysia
		Aung San Suu Kyi	Myanmar	State Counsellor of Myanmar
		Rodrigo Duterte	Philippines	President of the Philippines
		Lee Hsien Loong	Singapore	Prime Minister of Singapore	2nd invitation
		Prayut Chan-o-cha	Thailand	Prime Minister of Thailand	2nd invitation
		Nguyễn Xuân Phúc	Vietnam	Prime Minister of Vietnam	2nd invitation
2019		Cyril Ramaphosa[58][59]	South Africa	President of South Africa	2nd invitation
2020		Jair Bolsonaro[60]	Brazil	President of Brazil	3rd invitation
2021	No chief guest due to COVID-19 pandemic[61][62][note 7][note 8]
2022
2023		Abdel Fattah el-Sisi[66]	Egypt	President of Egypt			Droupadi Murmu
2024		Emmanuel Macron[67]	France	President of France	6th invitation
2025		Prabowo Subianto[68]	Indonesia	President of Indonesia	4th invitation

Notes

1. On each of these occasions, Edwina Mountbatten, Countess Mountbatten of Burma from United Kingdom was also the official guest for the parade.^[7][8]
2. Prince Philip also accompanied Queen Elizabeth II during the parade.^[15]
3. Attended Republic Day in Madras (Chennai).^[17]
4. No invitations were sent out possibly due to the demise of Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri on 11 January 1966 in Tashkent. The new government headed by Indira Gandhi was sworn in on 24 January 1966 (only two days before the Republic Day).^[19]
5. For the first time, the President of India (Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan) could not take the salute at the Republic Day parade due to ill-health.^[21] Mohammed Zahir Shah arrived on 28 January.^[22]
6. Attended only the Beating Retreat.^[25][26]
7. An invitation for 2021 was sent to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, but after a few weeks he cancelled his visit, citing the need to oversee pandemic response in the United Kingdom.^[63]
8. Invitations for 2022 were sent to leaders of five Central Asian nations – Kassym-Jomart Tokayev of Kazakhstan, Sadyr Japarov of Kyrgyzstan, Emomali Rahmon of Tajikistan, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow of Turkmenistan and Shavkat Mirziyoyev of Uzbekistan. But due to surge in COVID-19 cases and the new Omicron variant being on the rise, Indian government decided not to host foreign dignitaries.^[64][65]