Good read: Baba Ramdev's 6-hr harassment at Heathrow

[SWAPNIL NANKAR]

Here is what Gautum Sen in UK wrote on this incident:

Baba Ramdev, India's prominent Yoga guru and campaigner against corruption, was unexpectedly detained when he arrived at London's Heathrow airport on Friday, the 20th September. He had visited the UK regularly in recent years and was the guest of honour at the celebrations for Swami Vivekananda's 150th birth anniversary. The young Asian woman immigration officer informed him he would have to wait. When he enquired after a half hour why he was being held up, she curtly told him to remain in the detention centre, failing to recognise her famed guest. His hosts waiting outside were growing anxious and Baba Ramdev phoned to inform them he was not being allowed to enter the country. After three hours he exercised the right, he was told he had, to demand the reason. None was forthcoming.

Persistent representations from his hosts failed to elicit any explanation from the immigration authorities. Legal representatives who arrived to offer counsel and inquire had no luck either. The Indian High Commission in London was contacted, but claimed it could not fathom why Baba Ramdev was being denied entry. It cannot be said they evinced undue interest over the issue, perhaps conscious of the Congress party's abhorrence for Baba Ramdev and all his works. Eventually, after being detained for eight hours, Baba Ramdev was granted temporary entry to the UK, but required to return for a further interview the following day. His passport, the leaflets he was carrying and his personal diary were seized while Hindi and Sanskrit translators were sought to scrutinize them. The timing of the immigration interview he was required to attend coincided exactly with the commencement of the Vivekananda birth anniversary celebrations. It was evident they did not wish him to participate.

One of Baba's devotees telephoned the Rt. Honourable Keith Vaz, MP for Leicester and Chair of the Home Affairs Parliamentary Select Committee, a position of authority pertaining to official police and immigration policy. He swung into action immediately, inviting Baba Ramdev to his home to discuss the situation. It is unprecedented to be invited to the home of a MP to confer about an issue raised by a member of the public. Keith Vaz, whose wife happens to be a leading expert on immigration issues, spent several hours on the phone to the authorities involved at Heathrow, the Home Secretary as well as 10 Downing, Street, the prime minister's official residence. He berated the immigration authorities roundly and then unexpectedly accompanied Baba Ramdev to Heathrow airport. The immigration authorities suddenly became receptive and acceded to Keith Vaz's demand that Baba Ramdev's passport and the seized documents be restored to him immediately. All this only took five minutes and he was granted a two-year multiple entry visa on by the immigration authorities on their own initiative. Keith Vaz earned the profound gratitude of Baba Ramdev's followers and British Hindus for his huge efforts and extraordinary courtesy towards their revered saint.

It transpired that a coded notation, visible to scanners used in airports, had been imprinted in Baba Ramdev's passport by the authorities at New Delhi immigration control, as he was departing for the UK. Such a notation is reserved for terror suspects and drugs warlords and prompted an instant red alert when Baba Ramdev arrived at Heathrow. It would seem that the highest political authorities in New Delhi sought to disrupt Baba Ramdev's travel abroad, to the UK and US, where he was participating in various events connected to Swami Vivekananda's 150th birth anniversary. It can only be inferred that they have become so fearful of his campaign against corruption and support for political change in India that they were prepared to sink to the lowest depth imaginable. No doubt Baba Ramdev's support for Narendra Modi's prime ministerial candidature compounded their rage, prompting disregard for all legal and moral norms. They were prepared to instigate the humiliation and possible arrest of a Hindu saint to perpetuate their corrupt hold on power and persist in their increasing disregard for the Indian Constitution. The prime minister himself and his patron, who has usurped political and constitutional authority in India, must both be personally held to account for this outrage against Hindus.