The Indian Embassy, invoking diplomatic immunity, has refused to give any information about the ``physical harassment'', allegedly including sexual assault, that is being put out in considerable detail in the French media.

But the embassy lodged a protest with the French foreign office in Paris, saying that the girl, who is being held by the French police in ``clear violation of all diplomatic norms'', should be returned forthwith.

A French foreign ministry spokesman, who confirmed that an Indian citizen employed as a maid had fled her home and was now in hospital, said that the Indian embassy had been asked for an explanation.

Judicial sources told Agence France Presse that an enquiry was underway.

The 19-year-old girl, Lalita Oraon, is said to havebeen working as a domestic help with an Indian diplomat in the Commercial section of the embassy in Paris. A spokesman of the Ministry of External Affairs here, however, said he had no information about the incident.

According to reports in the French media, Oraon was treated ``like a slave'' and ``sexually abused and maltreated'' by her Indian employer, forcing her to run away from his house.

``The adolescent fled her employer's Paris home on Sunday, September 5,'' said Phillippe Boudin, director of the Committee against Modern-Day Slavery. ``She was found the same day wandering the streets carrying a knife, by a man who looked Indian, and to whom she said she wanted to commit suicide,'' Boudin added.

According to Boudin, Oraon was subsequently questioned by a special police squad in charge of minors. She said through an interpreter that she was an orphan from Bihar. But two days after she was taken to a monastery for shelter by the police, Oraon is believed to have thrown herself off a high wall andhad to be rushed to hospital suffering from fractures to the ankle and vertebra.

Oraon is then believed to have been operated for serious injuries also in the genital region by a prominent French urologist Bernard Debre, but it was not known when and how these injuries were caused.

``I have never seen anything like it in my whole life,'' Debre told AFP. ``She was suffering from blood-poisoning from wounds apparently caused by a blade that dated back several days.'' The doctor said the wounds could not have been accidental or self-inflicted.

Meanwhile, Indian diplomatic sources said that the French police did not release the girl despite being informed on the same day, September 5, that she was missing. Subsequently, despite repeated attempts by the Indian authorities to get in touch with Oraon, French officials refused to give out any information on her whereabouts.

``The embassy registers its protest against this denial of access,'' the diplomatic sources said. They said the embassy was readyto make all necessary arrangements to repatriate her back home to India.