US apologises for detaining Shah Rukh Khan, India upset

External Affairs Minister SM Krishna on Friday talked tough on the Shah Rukh Khan detention case at a New York aiport, saying that such incidents could not continue anymore. "It has become a habit these days to first detain and then apologise. This can't continue," said Krishna, who is in Moscow currently.

Meanwhile, India has asked its Ambassador to the US, Nirupama Rao, to take up the issue with the country.

The US Customs and Border Protection Department had sent a letter to the Indian Consulate on Friday expressing regret over the Bollywood actor's detention at New York's White Plain airport for over two hours. The letter alleged that Shah Rukh Khan had failed to inform the US authorities of his programme.

It added that the airport needed the approval of "senior authorities" to clear him. "The entire process took 75 minutes. After that, he left for Yale," the letter said.

Shah Rukh Khan was reportedly miffed after he was detained at the airport and described the incident as something that "always happens". Khan had arrived in the US to address students of the Yale University.

Khan, who has been named a Chubb Fellow, was understood to have arrived in a private plane at the airport.

Sources said that while everybody else was cleared by the immigration immediately, Khan was stopped for over two hours before being cleared by the immigration officials.

"Khan was very very upset at the episode. Yale University officials had to contact the Department of Homeland Security and the Immigration and Customs Department at Washington, when they come to know about his detention," sources said.

In 2009 also, he was stopped at the Newark airport and was released after two-hour of grilling.