Post 9/11, the airport security around the world changed - drastically so in the US. So, when the Indian ambassador to the US, Meera Shankar alighted at one in Mississippi last week, the US transport security administration personnel frisked her. And India, on Thursday, was livid, with external affairs minister S M Krishna terming the incident "unacceptable."

Shankar is a senior diplomat, an ambassador no less. It is reasonable to expect that as the host nation the US should do nothing to demean her position. India has extended security recuses to American VIPs and continues to do so. Hence, the anger at such a courtesy not being returned. But is this anger rational?

A decade after the most shocking terror attacks ever, the US has not seen another - big or small. Many credit it to the beefed up security measures the country has taken, with some going as far as championing the profiling at airports for security checks. Not that no one has been inconvenienced by the frisking. A US TV star who was recently put through a full-body scan at an airport claimed that the personnel singled her out because of her "attractive" looks. While such violating intrusions remain unpopular with some Americans, most believe that it is a necessary evil, as a recent poll indicates. Intrusive or not, the security checks could have deterred and prevented terror attacks.

On the other hand, attacks are like clockwork in India. Not that frisking American diplomats will bring the frequency down, but what is the sense in excluding them and expecting the US to do so? Is it not racial profiling, or worse, class profiling in its own way?

Immediately after the MEA expressed its outrage, the US secretary of state Hillary Clinton issued a statement saying that the US was "concerned" by the incident and would "review its policy". So, the patdown may not have violated any US protocol, to say the least. So, India, instead of armtwisting the US, should review its own policy of expemting VIPs, if all it seeks is egalitarian treatment from the US.

Diplomats enjoy a great deal of immunity in host nations, but are they to be excluded from patdowns at airports? Was India reaction over the frisking of Meera Shankar unwarranted?