India expels US diplomat after Devyani Khobragade's indictment

Hardeep Singh Puri, former India's permanent representative to the United Nations, backed the Indian government's move, saying "reciprocity was the best possible solution" to this unpleasant turn of events.

He said the US would soon realise its folly and would feel the pinch of their diplomatic privileges being withdrawn by the Indian government.

The US has been asked to discontinue all commercial activities from its premises without proper license, a move that is going to hurt not just the large American diplomatic community but the American expatriate population here that also enjoyed the privileges of the American club, bar and other duty-free facilities that the embassy was allowed to have in what is diplomatially known as the 'wink-and-nod' reciprocal system.

Puri said the US case will not stand in the court of public opinion and said there was no way out since India refused to accede to the US request to waive her immunity for prosecution.

C. Uday Bhaskar, a leading strategic analyst, hoped that the reciprocal action would now bring the unseemly row to a closure and the two countries "revert to quiet diplomacy" to sort out the issue now.

"The entire gamut of bilateral relations, in the political, military, commercial and scientific levels cannot be predicated on a single issue and there is urgent need to repair the damage done to the larger strategic relationship," Bhaskar said.