Beneath this distortion lies a great deal of cynicism, disappointment and anger at the treatment given by India to her former sons and daughters who decided, not always willingly, to adopt the citizenship of a foreign country.

At the heart of the growing chasm between India and PIOs is a new set of visa rules and procedures introduced in the name of national security, which cross-sections of the nearly two-million-strong Indian diaspora in the US describe as irrational and cumbersome.

PIOs, once courted by the Indian government, mostly for investments in India, abhor the treatment meted out to them by their motherland. They say they love India as much as their brethren in India do.

How did the relationship between India and her former nationals sour?

Ever since David Coleman Headley, a Pakistani-American, now held in a US prison for abetting terrorism, made visits to India on a tourist visa to scout for targets for the November 26 terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India has tightened its visa regime for PIOs, who are being urged to get the Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) card in lieu of a multiple-entry visa, which precludes the holder from re-entering India for two months since last exiting the country.

But to acquire the OCI — or, for that matter, a visa — former Indian nationals have to first surrender their Indian passports and obtain a so-called Citizenship Surrender Certificate. And that is the bone of contention. Many former Indian nationals were naturalised as US citizens years or even decades ago. They no longer have their old, expired Indian passports, which have either been lost or misplaced.

"This is a big joke. How can I produce my old Indian passport when I was naturalised 25 years back? I have moved around several cities in the US and have lost it. In any case, the passport expired two and a half decades back. How can anyone use an old, expired Indian passport to travel to India and cause mischief, as Indian diplomats contend?" an angry Ravi Nair, a New Jersey-based mechanical engineer, told Weekend Review.

Another grouse is that the staff handling visa matters at Indian missions is ill-equipped to answer questions. Their rude and unhelpful attitude further antagonises the PIOs, many of whom spend long hours waiting in the cold and snow to get their foot inside the missions.

Besides having to deal with physical and mental stress, applicants have to pay hefty fees for the issue of the surrender certificate. Although the fee was initially fixed at $75 (Dh275), the Indian government, facing protests, scaled it down to $20 for those who acquired foreign citizenship on or before May 31, 2010. The PIOs also oppose the penalty of $250 imposed on applicants who have held an Indian passport that has expired on or after January 1, 2005, and failed to get it cancelled within three years after the acquisition of the foreign nationality.

Not surprisingly, mass protests were held outside the Indian consulates in Houston, San Francisco, Chicago and New York to highlight delays in obtaining visas to visit India. Demonstrations by some 800 Indian-Americans in Houston on December 12 have shaken Indian diplomats; four people, including three past presidents of Houston's Gujarati Samaj, undertook a fast to register their protest against the draconian visa requirements.

Blistering comments from angry bloggers are a common reaction to the new rules. Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi, during his last visit to New York, confirmed in a conversation with this writer that his office had also received "many complaints", adding that he had asked Indian missions abroad to be "as helpful as possible, but rules have to be complied with as there are huge security concerns".

However, PIOs reject the argument of "huge security concerns" by saying that terrorists with nefarious designs do not generally apply for visas. Indeed, the perpetrators of the Mumbai carnage had taken the sea route from Pakistan, as Indian and US security experts confirm. An expired passport cannot be used again. Also, as India does not recognise dual citizenship, Indians renounce their Indian citizenship once they accept foreign citizenship.

Meanwhile, some PIOs have even contacted their Congressmen and also the Department of State. American politicians these days are willing to bend backwards for the powerful Indian diaspora, whose clout extends to mainstream American politics.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's offer at the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas in New Delhi in January to merge the OCI and PIO cards has been dismissed by some as a ploy to assuage frayed tempers. However, to be fair, the Indian missions are deluged with work as they suffer from a lack of manpower. Indian consul-general Prabhu Dayal, a respected diplomat in New York, has been explaining that the consulate faces a backlog of some 1,500 OCI and 300 PIO applications. The New York consulate receives about 200 applications a day.

"Ideally, we would like the Indian government to withdraw the ridiculous requirement of a surrender certificate, because it creates hardship while serving no practical purpose. If anything, it is alienating the Indian diaspora from its motherland," cautioned one Indian community leader.

Manik Mehta is a commentator on Asian affairs.

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