[In December, Ms.
Khobragade was arrested in New York on charges of lying to the United States
government to obtain a visa for her housekeeper, who prosecutors said had been
paid far less than New York State’s minimum wage. The Indian news
media criticizedher treatment while in detention, quoting Indian
officials as saying that she had been handcuffed and strip-searched before her
release on $250,000 bail.]
By Nida Najar
 |
Reuters
Devyani Khobragade, an
Indian diplomat, after her return to New Delhi on Jan. 10.
Ms. Khobragade was
arrested in New York last year on charges of lying to
the United States
government to obtain a visa for her housekeeper,
who prosecutors said had been
paid far less than
New York State’s minimum wage.
|
NEW DELHI —
The Ministry of External Affairs on Thursday welcomed an American court’s
dismissal of visa fraud charges against the Indian consular official Devyani
Khobragade, whose legal troubles had created tensions between India and the
United States.
In December, Ms.
Khobragade was arrested in New York on charges of lying to the United States
government to obtain a visa for her housekeeper, who prosecutors said had been
paid far less than New York State’s minimum wage. The Indian news
media criticizedher treatment while in detention, quoting Indian
officials as saying that she had been handcuffed and strip-searched before her
release on $250,000 bail.
On Jan. 9, Ms.
Khobragade was indicted by
a United States federal grand jury on visa fraud charges, which she moved to
dismiss on the grounds of her diplomatic immunity, which had been granted by
the State Department the day before.
The State Department
requested that the Indian government waive her immunity, which was denied,
after which the State Department ordered her out of the country. Ms. Khobragade
left for India the night of Jan. 9.
On Wednesday, the
United States District Court in New York dismissed the case against Ms.
Khobragade after determining that her diplomatic immunity was intact during the
time of her indictment.
“We welcome this
ruling, which dismisses the Jan. 9 indictment against Devyani
Khobragade and vacates any arrest warrant in the existing case,” Syed
Akbaruddin, the Ministry of External Affairs spokesman, said in a
statement.
After Ms. Khobragade’s
arrest, Indian officials responded by revoking certain diplomatic privileges to
American consular officials, including exemption from security checks at Indian
airports.
Reached by phone, Mr.
Akbaruddin said that the Indian government had begun examining diplomatic
privileges extended to American consular officials in India against those
extended to Indian consular officials in the United States after news spread of
Ms. Khobragade’s treatment during her arrest.
The United States
court’s dismissal applies only to the indictment returned on Jan. 9, leaving
prosecutors the option to file new charges against Ms. Khobragade if they
determine that the crimes she is suspected of committing were not part of her
official duties as a consular official.
“The court has no
occasion to decide whether the acts charged in the indictment constitute
‘official acts’ that would be protected by residual immunity,” the ruling said.
“However, if the acts charged in the indictment were not ‘performed in the
exercise of official functions,’ then there is currently no bar to a new
indictment against Khobragade.”
Narinder Singh, who
was the head of the legal and treaties division at the Ministry of External
Affairs from 2002 to 2012, said a number of cases involving
consular officials and their domestic helpcame up in his tenure,
many involving staff members who ran away and in effect became
undocumented immigrants in the host country.
In 2011, one such case
involved Prabhu Dayal, then India’s consul general in New York, who was sued in
civil court by a maid who accused him of subjecting her to nearly a year of
“forced labor and psychological coercion.”
“There’s no solution
to this unless the diplomats are paid more or unless the domestic help to
diplomats are employed by the Indian government,” Mr. Singh said.
Uttam Khobragade, Ms.
Khobragade’s father, said in an interview that while he was happy the case had
been dismissed, he was unhappy that there was any leeway for continued
prosecution for his daughter, who is now working for the Ministry of External
Affairs in New Delhi.
“The original
complaint must be taken back because the evidence proves that this is a false
complaint,” he said. “We want our daughter to be reinstated to her post in New
York. She must be allowed to complete her tour with diplomatic immunity.”
[On voting day, I was Mr. D’Souza’s polling agent, stationed inside a booth to represent him, along with agents for every other candidate. We had copies of the electoral roll for that particular booth, on which we ticked off the names of voters who showed up. My first brush with some of the realities of democracy came to me gradually through the day: Of an electorate of 1,067 for that booth, only 471 actually voted — less than 50 percent.]
MUMBAI, India — “Kalomington,” I remember, nearly threw a fit. “Sadoschand” was
more forgiving, even able to see some humor in it all. And “Debrokamilm On”? We
never found out, because he or she never showed up to vote.
I came to know about
these good folks in 1995, when I helped an independent candidate with his
election campaign for Maharashtra’s Legislative Assembly, representing the
district where I live. Though this was 19 years ago, I have good reason to
believe India’s upcoming parliamentary elections will offer many similar
vignettes.
The candidate was the
retired, now late, Maj. Gen. Eustace D’Souza (no relation). A veteran of
several wars, he was proudest of how he and his regiment, the Maratha Light
Infantry, held the line in Arunachal Pradesh during the 1962 war with China.
For General D’Souza’s efforts fighting Pakistan in 1971, our president awarded
him the Param Vishisht Seva Medal, recognizing “distinguished service of the
most exceptional order,” in 1974.
In the election, none
of this mattered. Despite my efforts, or possibly because of them, this
certified war hero was soundly thrashed. But while it lasted, the campaign was
an instructive, often even delightful, ride. My first up-close look at Indian
politics, it opened my eyes to no end.
At a
meet-your-candidates gathering, for example, one candidate told us exactly why
we should vote for him: He had “donated 86 bottles of blood” and was about to
“go on strike against the Sea Rock Hotel.”
Another referred to
himself as “Doctor” and began every speech or conversation by pronouncing that
he had written “several thousand letters to the editor.” At one point, he asked
to meet the major general for a “frank” discussion.
“There’s no room for
two good candidates,” he said over coffee at a mutual friend’s elegant home,
holding up two long fingers. “We’ll only divide each other’s votes. So I think
you should withdraw in my favor.”
In the days after Mr.
D’Souza declined this generous offer, he got several reminders of certain
letter-writing skills — he referred to them, chuckling, as “love letters.” All
were typed on the same pink paper on the same typewriter with a faulty “s.” All
were signed in the same blue ink by mysterious people named Alice or Melvyn, or
just “Yours [sic] admirers.” All said similar things: “You are very old!”;
“Votes will be divided because of you!”; “You should withdraw and help a good
candidate like the Doctor to win.”
Let’s just say the
major general had a pretty good idea who wrote the love letters.
On voting day, I was
Mr. D’Souza’s polling agent, stationed inside a booth to represent him, along
with agents for every other candidate. We had copies of the electoral roll for
that particular booth, on which we ticked off the names of voters who showed up.
My first brush with some of the realities of democracy came to me gradually
through the day: Of an electorate of 1,067 for that booth, only 471 actually
voted — less than 50 percent.
I got a good sense of
whom those 471 were. In an area filled with multistoried buildings, including
mine, not one managed even a one-third turnout — the famously apathetic
“middle” and “upper” classes, of course. In contrast, of 75 voters in a slum
pocket sandwiched between two tall buildings on my lane, 74 voted.
But not strolling down
to the voting booth had at least one advantage: You might save yourself some
exasperation, as experienced by a lady named Clementine. Our rolls had her down
as “Kalomington.” Two decades later, I still remember her standing speechless,
her face flushed in anger at her mutated name. Luckily, the officials in the
booth also had the rolls in Marathi, the local language, and there, her name
was close enough to “Clementine” that they were willing to accept her photo ID.
Later, a Sebastian
found himself listed as “Sadoschand,” white-haired Benedicta and her son Nigel
were “Bendikata” and “Naygil.” And if we never learned who “Debrokamilm On”
was, I knew exactly who “Petristna Kayrsko” was, even though she was abroad and
so didn’t turn up, either: my aunt Patricia Carrasco.
The mangled names had
this in common: They were usually Christian. Easily 95 percent of the Christian
names were misspelled, most horribly so. In contrast, nearly every Hindu, most
Muslim and about half the Parsi names were correct. Not that this indicated
some religious bias. While enlisting voters, the electoral officers took down
names in Marathi and later transcribed them to print the rolls in English.
Doing that, unfamiliar names like “Carrasco” and “Benedicta” morphed in unpredictable
directions.
Much has changed since
1995. Nobody uses typewriters anymore, so if today’s candidates — is the Doctor
running again? — write love letters to each other, no faulty “s” will give them
away. And I don’t have the electoral rolls, so I don’t know about mutilated
names.
Then again, this is
2014, and the rolls are on the Election Commission’s website, complete with a
search engine. So I pulled up our constituency’s list of voters and tried to
find my mother, Neela, in there. Eye-opener time, once again.
First: When I
searched, a message said she was not listed. But she has been on the rolls for
decades; why would she have been removed? So I pulled up the rolls themselves,
which are in Marathi. I navigated to my ma’s street and, sure enough, found her
name. Not only that: I also found my father, who died in 2007.
Second: My father’s
name is Joseph Bain D’Souza. This is relevant.
Third: In the Marathi
listing, my mother’s name is spelled “Nila” rather than “Neela.” I returned to
the search engine with “Nila.” Bingo. How many people have been defeated
because spelling errors mean they can’t search for their names?
Fourth: The search
also produced her “husband’s name,” which is “Josefaben.” Now, Gujaratis often
refer to women with the suffix “-ben,” meaning “sister.” I can see my father
now, guffawing over his mutation into “Josefa-ben,” a rangy six-foot sari-clad
woman from Gujarat.
Fifth: Have any of the
mangled names from 1995 survived to 2014? Inquiring minds, like mine, want to
know. From the 1995 rolls, I picked “Hebridata Joyn Didabrio” and “Kilveen
Albart Didabrio,” listed as a 48-year-old male and a 42-year-old female,
respectively.
No, I have no idea
what “Hebridata” and “Kilveen” might more correctly be, though “Didabrio” is
probably “D’Abreu” and “Albart” likely “Albert.”
So I searched online
for “Hebridata.” Bingo. The 2014 rolls have “Hebridata John Didabrio” and
“Kilavin Albert Didabrio” — some minor corrections in the names there. Nineteen
years on, they are 62 and 63, respectively — some corrections in the ages too,
clearly.
Also, Hebridata is now
listed as female and Kilavin male — some corrections in their genders as well,
clearly.
Dilip D’Souza is a
writer based in Mumbai. He has written four books, most recently “The
Curious Case of Binayak Sen.” Find him on Twitter @DeathEndsFun.