The transfer of diplomat Devyani Khobragade to India's Permanent Mission at the United Nations would grant her full-diplomatic immunity temporarily and protect her from any arrest in the US, but the visa fraud case against her would go uninterrupted, US official said.

"For anyone, it would apply for the length of time that they have that diplomatic status. But it doesn't retroactively wipe out past discretions," the State Department spokesperson, Jen Psaki said yesterday.

"Receiving diplomatic immunity does not nullify any previously existing criminal charges. Those remain on the books. Nor does obtaining diplomatic immunity protect the diplomat from prosecution indefinitely. It relates to the status of a diplomat's current status for the length of the time of that status," Psaki said.

Diplomatic immunity means, among other things, that a foreign diplomat is not subject to criminal jurisdiction in the United States for the time they are a diplomat, for the time they have that immunity, she said. She added that,"when immunity is conferred, it does not retroactively take effect at a previous point in time but relates solely to the diplomat's current status."

"So, I think some of the confusion here has been if there is a change in status, does that mean that there is a clean slate from past charges. There's not," Paski said.