Taking strong exception to the arrest of Indian Deputy Consul General in New York, Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh on Friday summoned US Ambassador Nancy Powell here to convey New Delhi’s “shock over absolutely unacceptable” treatment to the diplomat.
Deputy Consul General Devyani Khobragade, 39, was arrested and handcuffed on Thursday in public on visa fraud charges before being released on a $250,000 bond after pleading not guilty in court. She was taken into custody on a street as she was dropping her daughter to school after the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, India-born Preet Bharara, announced charges of visa fraud against her.
Bharara alleged that Khobragade made false statements in a visa application for an Indian national employed as a babysitter and housekeeper at her home in New York. She was charged with one count each of visa fraud and making false statements, which carry maximum prison sentences of ten years and five years, respectively.
Khobragade, the mother of two young daughters and a Chevening scholar, was taken into custody by law enforcement officials and produced before US Magistrate Judge Debra Freeman of Manhattan federal court late in the afternoon for an arraignment hearing. She did not speak during the hearing except to say she agrees with the terms and conditions of her bail. She was released on a $250,000 bond and submitted her diplomatic passport in court. The next hearing was set for January 13.
The Indian Embassy said it had been informed about Khobragade being taken into custody. It said the action was apparently taken on the basis of allegations made by her former India-based domestic assistant, Sangeeta Richard, who has been absconding since June. The Delhi High Court issued an interim injunction in September to restrain Richard from instituting any action against Khobragade outside India on the terms or conditions of her employment.
Reacting strongly to the issue, the Foreign Secretary told Powell in New Delhi that the treatment meted out to the senior diplomat was “totally unacceptable” and she was entitled to the courtesies under various multilateral conventions dealing with diplomatic fraternity posted in foreign countries, Government sources said here.
“We are shocked and appalled at the manner in which she has been humiliated by the US authorities. We have taken it up forcefully with the US Government through our Embassy in Washington. We are also reiterating, in no uncertain terms, to the US Embassy here that this kind of treatment to one of our diplomats is absolutely unacceptable,” spokesperson in the Ministry of External Affairs Syed Akbaruddin said.
He also said the Ministry was working to resolve this matter at the earliest and if there were issues of legal nature they will be resolved separately, however, this sort of behaviour was “totally unacceptable.” He also said “nothing entails the humiliation of a young woman with two small children publicly. A person who has been a diplomat sent there to represent her country. We will take issue of legal nature separately but there is no justification or acceptability of what has happened to the young diplomat who had gone to drop her children to school.”
The spokesperson said while the Ministry was in the process of resolving the issue, it did not mean that what has happened was not “substantive issue,” asserting that it will be contested with “extreme seriousness.” Akbaruddin also said “It does not absolve the US authorities of having humiliated and traumatised an Indian diplomat performing her duty.”
This is the third case involving a senior official of the New York Indian Consulate in three years. In June 2011, a former housekeeper had sued India’s then Consul General in New York Prabhu Dayal accusing him of intimidating her into a year of forced labour. Indian maid Shanti Gurung won a case against Neena Malhotra in 2012. Malhotra had served as a Press and Culture Counselor at the New York Consulate from 2006-2009.