Thaindian News

New Delhi, Jan 13 (IANS) Indian diplomats Wednesday got consular access to 21 Indians detained by Chinese authorities in Shenzhen for allegedly smuggling diamonds. They are being looked after well and have been served vegetarian food, official sources here said.
An official from the Indian embassy in Beijing and another from the Indian consulate in Shenzhen met each of the detainees individually.

The officials sought information about the circumstances under which they were held, the official sources said.

The diplomats will now decide whether the detenus need any help from the Indian embassy in getting legal assistance, the sources added.

Twenty-one Indians were detained by the Anti-Smuggling Bureau Jan 8 in Shenzhen and were charged with illegally bringing in diamonds from Hong Kong to Shenzhen.

“They are in good, stable condition and are being looked after well,” the sources said.

“They have been given good vegetarian food as most of them are Gujaratis. Getting vegetarian food in Shenzhen is not so easy,” the sources added.

The Shenzhen incident has elicited protests from diamond traders in India, who have an important presence at the Shanghai Diamond Exchange.

“We don’t have any confirmed reports or clues to these arrests…There seems to be something fishy,” said Rohit Mehta, president of the Surat Diamond Association.

Diamond traders from Surat have insisted that the detained Indian merchants are innocent.

The arrests of the Indian diamond workers came a day after three Chinese engineers were arrested in Chhattisgarh for a chimney crash at the Bharat Aluminium Company Ltd (BALCO) plant in Korba, which killed 41 workers in September last year.