The Indian government is reportedly unhappy with American visa regulations that require biometric screening of travellers using diplomatic passports, albeit on personal business.
Last week, senior officials from the external affairs ministry met diplomats in the US embassy here to seek "clarifications" about a key grey area in the fingerprinting rule: what happens to holders of diplomatic passports? As matters stand, the only exception permissible under the new US statute is for diplomatic passport holders travelling on official work.
It means that if external affairs minister Yashwant Sinha were to fly in to New York on personal business - say, to visit relatives - he would have to leave behind at JFK airport a freshly minted set of fingerprints.
If it were up to me, diplomats would be the ones whom I'd double check :S In fact, I don't see why diplomats even on official business need special privileges - they need to experience the same treatment meted out to every other citizen of their country.
This Times Of India article can be found here. Meanwhile, the number of applications from Indian students to American universities has also come down this year: this has also been attibuted in part to the tightening visa norms in the United States.
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