Zee Media Bureau
New York: Uttar Pradesh Cabinet Minister and senior Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan has alleged that he was insulted at a US airport on Wednesday.
Khan, who is accompanying state Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav for a Harvard University event in the US, was detained briefly for questioning at Boston International Airport.
Khan alleged that officials at the Boston Airport not just frisked him but also misbehaved with him.
According to sources familiar with the incident, Khan was detained for about 10 minutes for "further questioning" at Boston Logan International Airport on Wednesday after he landed in a scheduled British Airways flight from India.
The UP Urban Development Minister is in the US along with Yadav to attend a symposium on South Asia at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where they presented a study on the world famous "Kumbh Mela" held at Allahabad.
In protest, Khan has decided to come back after a short stay.
The sources said that when the visiting team landed at the airport, the Immigration and Border Protection officials accorded due courtesy and respect at the arrival point and even helped them in filling the arrival forms for entry into the US.
They were received and escorted by the officials of the Consulate General of India in New York and after they were cleared for entry, a woman officer of the US Customs and Border Protection wing of the Homeland Security took Khan to an adjacent room "for further questioning". The extended interview lasted for ten minutes and the minister was then cleared.
The Indian Embassy in Washington has taken serious note of the questioning of Khan and has raised the issue with the State Department there.
"The issue has been taken up with the State Department," Embassy spokesman M Sridharan said in response to a question if the mission was aware of the incident at Boston airport on Wednesday.
(With PTI inputs)
