By Abhishek Prabhat BBC correspondent in Delhi

Indian IT firms have been in big demand

An external affairs ministry spokesman in Delhi said the IT professionals were interrogated by the Dutch authorities and then asked to leave the Netherlands despite having valid visas.

The spokesman, Navtej Sarna, said the treatment given to Indian software workers was grossly unfortunate, objectionable and patently unwarranted.

He said the Indian government has expressed its disapproval to the Dutch ambassador in Delhi.

Nearly 15 software professionals, working for an Indian company - I-Flex Solutions - were questioned in Amsterdam on Thursday.

The company said it was not aware of the exact extent of investigations, but that they understood they were questioned over visa-related matters.

Complaints

The employees were later told by the Dutch authorities to leave the country within a week.

Around 270 Indians were earlier arrested in Malaysia

The company said the Chief Executive Officer of its Netherlands subsidiary, Senthil Kumar, was also arrested by the police in London, apparently following a complaint by the Dutch government.

The Indian spokesman said Mr Kumar remained in custody on Friday.

He added that the Indian Government has lodged a protest with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London.

Mr Sarna said Mr Kumar has been denied consular access which, he said, was a violation of international law.

I-Flex is among India's top 20 software exporters with a turnover of more than 100 million dollars.

In the Netherlands, the company is mainly in the business of providing software solutions for banking.

Indonesian detention

The detention of I-Flex employees was the third incident involving Indian IT workers abroad since December last year.

The chief executive officer of another IT company - Polaris - was detained by the Indonesian police last year.

He was released following the intervention of the Indian information technology minister.

Earlier this month, 270 Indian IT professionals were detained in Malaysia.

The Malaysian government later apologised and ordered a probe into the incident.

A leading IT body in India, Nasscom (National Association of Software and Service Companies), has expressed concern over such incidents.

Nasscom said it plans to closely work with the IT industry and embassies of various countries to ensure greater understanding of visa-related issues.