Amazon Halts Sale of Tricolour Doormat After Sushma’s Visa Threat

Earlier, Swaraj tweeted that she had asked the Indian High Commission in Canada to take up the issue with Amazon.

Sushma Swaraj, External Affairs Minister, India. (Photo: Altered by The Quint)

Amazon.com removed doormats resembling the Indian Tricolour from its Canadian website on Wednesday, after India’s Minister of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj on Wednesday, threatened to rescind visas of its employees if they did not stop selling the product.

"Amazon must tender unconditional apology," India's External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said on Twitter. "They must withdraw all products insulting our national flag immediately."

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The doormat, sold by a third-party on Amazon's Canadian portal, was taken down late on Wednesday.

"The item is no longer available for sale on the site," a spokeswoman for Amazon said in an email.

Amazon’s portal in Canada sells doormats fashioned around other national flags, but under Indian law, any desecration of its flag is punishable with fines and imprisonment.

Amazon's official support account on Twitter had earlier responded to angry user comments on Twitter by saying the mats were not being sold on their Indian portal and the concerns had been escalated.

The remark comes after a petition was filed on Change.org to take down the page advertising the doormat featuring the Indian flag. (Photo: The Quint)

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Swaraj tweeted that she had asked the Indian High Commission in Canada to take up the issue with Amazon, after it was brought to her attention by a Twitter user from Mumbai.

Swaraj is a prolific user of the social media website and often responds to tweets directed at her.

Amazon is making a huge bet on India and has vowed to invest more than $5 billion as it takes on home-grown Flipkart and Snapdeal for a bigger share of the world's fastest growing internet services market.

In an event attended by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Washington last year, Amazon Chief Executive Jeff Bezos said India was the company's fastest growing region.