Washington: The bitter India-U.S. diplomatic row over an Indian diplomat may have been defused for now, but Americans in New Delhi are not likely to get their swimming pool, hamburgers, bowling and booze back anytime soon.

For reciprocity is the name of the game since the U.S. chose to arrest, strip search and slap a criminal case of visa fraud against Devyani Khobragade, India's then deputy consul general in New York, before India's hardball diplomacy sent her back home safe.

India has neither been "petty" nor "irresponsible" in "a vindictive campaign against U.S. diplomats in New Delhi" as the influential Washington Post suggested in a recent editorial, a diplomatic source said noting that diplomatic privileges cannot be a one way street.

As Sridharan Madhusudhanan, press counsellor at the Indian embassy in Washington pointed out in a letter to the Post, U.S. "officials posted in consulates have been issued identity cards with stipulations similar to those their Indian counterparts receive in the United States."
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