Amazon offers for sale Tricolour doormats, Sushma Swaraj issues stern warning

January,12,2017:

We will not grant Indian Visa to any Amazon official warned the Minister.

On Wednesday, Foreign minister Sushma Swaraj  threatened to refuse visas to Amazon officials & withdraw already given visas from Amazon employees in India, if the global e-tailer didn't stop selling doormats with the Indian flag on them.

Swaraj said this in a series of tweets after she received a complaint regarding this on Twitter.

The minister while seeking an unconditional apology from Amazon, also asked the Indian embassy to take up this matter with Amazon Canada.

Swaraj tweeted that they must withdraw all the products insulting our national flag immediately.

Sushma Swaraj's warning came right after Atul Bhobe posted screenshots of the products on sale on Amazon Canada's website asking her to take action.

These doormats had invited protests from Indians in Canada as well and lead to an online petition on change.org.

Amazon has removed the page from its site, but has not yet complied with the Minister's directive.

Last year in June, Amazon had drawn disapproval in India after doormats with images of Indian gods were on sale on Amazon.com -- the US site.

The online protest very soon turned into a huge outrage on Twitter with trends such as #BoycottAmazon. Later Amazon had removed these items from its website.