- Indian authorities briefly detained Zahed Ur Rahman, a top Bangladeshi adviser, at Delhi’s IGI Airport on June 14.
- Rahman was eventually cleared but refused to enter India, choosing to return to Dhaka via Colombo instead.
- Bangladesh issued a formal protest and summoned India’s acting High Commissioner over the diplomatically sensitive incident.
(DELHI, INDIA) – Indian authorities briefly stopped Zahed Ur Rahman, an adviser to the Bangladeshi Prime Minister, at Delhi’s IGI Airport on June 14, 2026, kept him waiting for about two and a half hours, then cleared him to enter India.
Rahman did not go on into the country after clearance. He chose instead to return to Dhaka via Colombo.
Bangladeshi media said Rahman had traveled to India to attend the 28th Meeting of the Committee of Senior Officials of the Indian Ocean Rim Association. The Indian Ocean Rim Association, or IORA, meeting was scheduled for June 15–16 in India.
Advance diplomatic communication had been sent before his arrival, Bangladeshi media reported. The stop at the airport still went ahead during immigration and security checks.
Reports from Bangladesh said Rahman was traveling on a regular green passport with a SAARC sticker, not a diplomatic passport. His name was flagged during immigration and security screening.
The episode drew a formal response in Dhaka on Monday. Bangladesh issued an official protest over the incident.
Bangladesh’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned Pawan Badhe, the acting Indian High Commissioner in Dhaka, after the airport stop. Foreign Ministry officials in Bangladesh described the incident as unexpected.
The sequence of events, as described in the reports from Bangladesh, was narrow but diplomatically sensitive. Rahman arrived in Delhi, faced a delay of about two and a half hours at IGI Airport, received clearance to enter, and then left on a routing back to Dhaka through Colombo rather than proceed to the meeting for which he had traveled.
His travel status formed part of the scrutiny around the case. He was not carrying a diplomatic passport, and Bangladeshi media linked the delay to a flag raised against his name during checks.
The meeting he was expected to attend involved senior officials of the Indian Ocean Rim Association, a grouping that brings together countries around the Indian Ocean. The timing placed the airport stop one day before the scheduled start of the June 15–16 gathering.
Bangladesh’s protest pushed the matter beyond an airport screening issue and into formal diplomatic channels. By summoning Badhe, Dhaka signaled that it viewed the treatment of Zahed Ur Rahman as more than a routine travel disruption.
Rahman’s decision to turn back after being cleared left the incident with a stark final image: a prime ministerial adviser arrived in Delhi for a regional meeting, waited at the airport for about two and a half hours, won permission to enter, and boarded a flight back toward Dhaka instead.
