Do as I say, not as I do!

After nearly two months of being in a Lahore jail for killing a Pakistani duo, CIA contractor Raymond Davis was released, ending the stand-off between Islamabad and Washington.

There is a debate over whether the US paid 'blood money' for the release with the families of the Pakistanis killed telling a Pakistani court that they were dropping the charges in exchange for "blood money" while the US authorities deny any such payment.

As the diplomatic machinery went into overdrive with the US secretary of state Hillary Clinton herself calling prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to emphasise "the early resolution of the Davis issue in interest of continued strategic partnership," an old couple, Syamala Buddhi and Captain Buddhi K Subbarao, nearly 13,000 km away in Navi Mumbai, have been following the case very, very closely.

Their 40-year-old IIT alumnus son Vikram has been jailed by US authorities since 2006. In December 2005, after an internet message urging Iraqis to avenge the death of 312,769 Iraqi women and children, authorities alleged that the message was traced to Vikram's computer at Purdue University, Indiana.

In January, 2006 the US secret service said he posed no threat. Yet by May, they had strangely changed their minds and picked him up again.

When the case went to trial, Vikram's parents' say crucial evidence was held back, leading to him being found guilty. He was handed a 57-month prison sentence.

Flying in the face of American claims of justice and liberty, Subbarao and his wife went to the US after their son's arrest to help him out, and were forced to leave after the US authorities refused to extend their visa and barred them from entering the US for 10 years.

"Aren't both Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama mothers?" Syamalal broke down over the telephone when I called her. "Why can't they understand my anguish?"

It seems more than a bit strange that the same Americans who were so riled about the way the Iranians handled Roxana Saberi's case can themselves be oblivious to "the fact there is just no case against Vikram."

That is what external affairs minister SM Krishna told Vikram's parents when they met him three months ago, soon after the last letter from him telling them not to worry.

Denied access to email in the Texan prison where he's been shifted, Vikram is not even being allowed to write to letters "in the interest of his own security."

All this leaves me with sense of deja vu. In 1998, after the nuclear tests by India in Pokhran, the US had led atomic powers in slapping sanctions against India.

Amul which is often bang-on with its hoardings showed an angry Uncle Sam wagging a finger at the Amul girl saying, "Do as I say, not as I do!"