Indian diplomat at heart of row with U.S. urged to stand for parliament
By Shyamantha Asokan and Sruthi Gottipati NEW DELHI (Reuters) - An Indian political party has urged the woman at the center of a diplomatic storm in the United States to stand for parliament, highlighting how public outrage has turned the case into a battleground for votes ahead of next year's election. Devyani Khobragade stands accused in New York of fraudulently obtaining a work visa for her housekeeper and paying a fraction of the minimum wage. Furious that one of its foreign service officers had been handcuffed and subjected to a strip search like "a common criminal", India on Tuesday removed security barriers outside the U.S. embassy in New Delhi and withdrew some privileges accorded to American diplomats. Politicians, including the leaders of the two main parties, refused to meet a delegation of visiting U.S. lawmakers. "Because of the election, they will try to outdo each other," said Neerja Chowdhury, a political analyst and a former political editor of Indian Express newspaper. "They don't want to be seen as weak on the issue when the mood in the country is one of huge anger about this." The regional Samajwadi Party offered to put Khobragade up as a candidate in the election, due to be held by May, in one of the parliamentary constituencies in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, whose voters could swing the outcome. "Whatever happened with her is condemnable," said Azam Khan, the state's urban development minister, according to media reports. "If she returns to India, we are ready to give her a ticket for the 2014 polls." Seizing on the fact that Khobragade was a lower-caste Hindu, the leader of a regional party that champions the rights of millions at the bottom of India's social hierarchy, accused the government of reacting slowly because of her caste. "If this woman was from another caste, the central government wouldn't have delayed taking action for so long," said Mayawati, head of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in Uttar Pradesh. Competition for the votes of low-caste "Dalits", who account for about 16.5 percent of the population, is intense. "Had it not been for the election, or had she come from an upper caste, this would not have gained mass appeal. It's a very competitive time and all the parties have to show a pro-Dalit face," said Ajay Gudavarthy of the politics department at New Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University. Breathless and indignant coverage by Indian TV news channels of the diplomat's ordeal at the hands of U.S. marshals has added to a sense that national pride has been wounded. A senior member of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, currently the favorite to form the next government, has even suggested that partners of gay U.S. diplomats in the country should be put behind bars for contravening India's newly restored ban on gay sex. There has been little focus, however, on the predicament of the housekeeper, whose lawyer says was denied her wages, underpaid for work and now feels it would be unsafe to return to India. "One wonders why there is so much outrage about the alleged treatment of the Indian national accused of perpetrating these acts, but precious little outrage about the alleged treatment of the Indian victim and her spouse," Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement on Wednesday. The dismay over Khobragade's treatment may be a reflection of the special treatment sometimes given to affluent and elite citizens in India, who are rarely seen being brought to book. Few were surprised this week when a former government minister who was jailed for five years in October for his part in a multi-million-dollar embezzlement racket was granted bail and walked free. Anand Grover, a leading Indian human rights lawyer, said that minorities and the poor were often dealt with harshly in detention, but "people from the upper class will be treated differently". (Writing by John Chalmers; Editing by Nick Macfie)
