India Hints At Steps Being Taken To Ensure Comfort Of Diplomat At Centre Of Row With U.S

The UN mission is also located in New York, the city in which Indian Diplomat Devyani Khobragade was posted as the deputy consul general at the consulate when she was arrested and strip-searched last week for visa fraud relating to her maid.Indian media reported on Wednesday that Khobragade was shifted to India's permanent mission to the United Nations.

"We are taking certain steps and measures to ensure that our officer (Devyani Khobragade), who had to bear certain difficulties and problems, does not face them again in future. We have already taken some steps, let us see how much useful they have proven to be," said Salman Khurshid,India's Foreign Minister, while replying to questions about Khobragade be transferred to the UN mission.

India took retaliatory measures against the United States on Wednesday in a row over an Indian diplomat who complained of being stripped and forced to undergo "cavity searches" while in U.S. detention.

"We have asked them to give identities of all the Indians employed by their Consulates and their embassy members with their pan card numbers and their bank statements. We have taken away the passes that they get as a special privilege going to the airports. We have certainly taken away the barricades that they have unlawfully put up. And in no uncertain terms have expressed displeasure at the way she has been treated," said Preneet Kaur, India's Junior Minister of Foreign Affairs.

In an email to colleagues, Khobragade complained of "repeated handcuffing, strip searching and cavity searches, swabbing" and being detained in a holding cell with petty criminals despite her "incessant assertions of immunity".

The email, reported in Indian media and confirmed as accurate by the government, caused outrage. With a general election due soon, politicians are determined not to be seen as soft on such an issue or unpatriotic.

On Wednesday, students of Delhi University protested outside the US Embassy in New Delhi to register their anger and anguish over the treatment meted out to Indians in the U.S.

"We are protesting outside the American Embassy against the ill treatment meted out to Indians. This will continue till Americans don't apologize from Indians and if they continue to insult Indian women then we will stage a bigger demonstration and also burn their effigy," said Anubhav Singh, a Student participating in the demonstration.

Supporters of a right-wing opposition party also held a small protest near the U.S. embassy on Wednesday. About 30 demonstrators, some wearing masks of President Barack Obama and sarongs made from the U.S. flag, demanded an apology.

The U.S. State Department said it had told the Indian government it expects New Delhi to protect its embassy and stressed it did not want the incident with the diplomat to hurt ties.

The embassy did not respond to requests for information about what action would be taken to replace the barriers. The compound has several other layers of security and is protected by a high wall.

Status conscious Indian dignitaries are often able to skip security checks and deal with legal problems discreetly in India. Less delicate handling abroad can be a shock.

A series of incidents in which politicians and celebrities have been detained or frisked at U.S. airports has heightened sensitivities about what is seen as harsh treatment abroad.

Shah Rukh Khan, one of Bollywood's best-loved actors, was detained at White Plains airport near New York last year and at Newark airport in 2009. Former president APJ Abdul Kalam was frisked on board a plane at New York's JFK airport in 2011.

The Khobragade case is the latest concerning the Indian elite's alleged exploitation of their domestic workers, both at home and abroad.

Another official at India's consulate in New York was fined almost $1.5 million last year for using her maid as forced labour. Last month, the wife of a member of parliament was arrested in Delhifor allegedly beating her maid to death.

India says Khobragade's former housekeeper left her employer a few months ago and demanded help to obtain permanent resident status in the United States. She is thought to be in the United States but her whereabouts are not known.

One Indian government minister, Shashi Tharoor, has argued that it was not reasonable to expect diplomats from developing countries to pay the U.S. minimum wage to domestic staff, since the envoys themselves earned less than that.