India's tit-for-tat forces US ambassador Nancy Powell to call off Nepal vacation?

NEW DELHI: US ambassador Nancy Powell had a first-hand experience of India's ire as officials here politely declined to accord her special airport privileges for her Christmas vacation to Nepal.

The government had on December 19 - a week after the arrest of diplomat Devyani Khobragade — withdrawn all special airport passes to the US diplomats that allowed them access to several places at the airport not just while travelling but also for receiving and seeing off guests. It said this was a reciprocal measure as Indian diplomats were not given the same passes in the US.

However, Lee McManis, acting spokesperson for the US embassy, said Powell's "personal holiday plans in Nepal were cancelled to deal with pressing issues", implying that her decision had nothing to do with the withdrawal of special privileges.

After receiving a communication from the US Embassy about Powell's plan to travel to Nepal, the government declined to accord her any special privileges as her airport pass stood withdrawn. The ambassador's special pass came with a photo identity card unlike the "floating passes" reserved for junior diplomats. The withdrawal of the pass means that Powell will have to travel like an ordinary passenger. She will be forced to stand in a queue and also lend herself to routine frisking by security personnel.

Sources said Powell will not get any privilege in India that her Indian counterpart in the US doesn't get. The government justified this saying that Indian ambassador to the US too travels like an ordinary person. Officials cited the example of the then Indian ambassador to the US Meera Shankar, who was subjected to a public pat-down by security officials at Jackson-Evers International Airport in Mississippi in 2010. She was subjected to a secondary screening by security officials despite Shankar having presented her diplomatic credentials. India's envoy to the UN Hardeep Puri was also detained at Houston airport in Texas after he refused to take his turban off.

The special pass given to the US ambassador is given to other heads of diplomatic missions only on a reciprocal basis. Indian officials pointed out that Indian diplomats in the US are forced to approach the state department every time they require special access in any airport. India issues floating passes to diplomats from other countries too but has said this will now be strictly on a reciprocal basis.

In a sign of things to come, the Association of Indian Diplomats (AID), which comprises retired Indian ambassadors, on Friday issued a statement demanding that the government insist on an official apology from the US for the treatment meted out to diplomat Devyani Khobragade and also withdrawal of all charges against her.

The government has already withdrawn several diplomatic and consular privileges accorded earlier to US officials. Putting further pressure on the government to act, AID also demanded that the government raise the issue in all appropriate international bodies to ensure that no diplomat from any country was treated in a similar fashion.

"The Association is dismayed at the specious, inaccurate and bureaucratic arguments that the state department and other US authorities have put forward to try to justify such selective and discriminatory treatment of the Indian diplomat as standard American procedure,'' said AID, adding that there was a clear failure on the part of the US to honour its international commitments under the Vienna Conventions on Diplomatic and Consular Relations.

The US continues to seek more time for submitting details sought by India, including salaries paid to all Indian staff employed at the US consulates, citing Christmas and New Year vacations. They have also not filed the details of salaries paid to Indian staff and others in their schools in Delhi and Chennai.

India's new envoy S Jaishankar on Friday met top US officials and sought withdrawal of charges against Khobargade as the state department said it was looking into the issue of full diplomatic immunity which she was entitled to in her capacity as advisor to India's permanent mission to the UN. Immediately after presenting his credentials to the office of chief of protocol, he met under-secretary for political affairs Wendy Sherman and under-secretary for management Patrick F Kennedy of the state department.