India 'intelligence' official plotted to kill Sikh activist on US soil

An Indian government official has directed a $100,000 plot to assassinate a prominent Sikh separatist leader in New York City after the man advocated to establish a sovereign state for Sikhs, US authorities said as charges against a man from India who they say was part of the murder plot were unsealed.

Last spring, US officials became aware of the plot to kill Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, who is considered a terrorist by the Indian government.

The US Drug Enforcement Administration [DEA] stopped the plot when the foreign government employee recruited an international narcotics trafficker to commit the murder, DEA administrator Anne Milgram said on Wednesday.

The government official was only described as "CC-1" in an indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court that charged Nikhil Gupta, 52, an Indian national who had lived in India, with murder-for-hire and conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire.

US Attorney Damian Williams and other federal officials announced the charges in a release.

"The defendant conspired from India to assassinate, right here in New York City, a US citizen of Indian origin who has publicly advocated for the establishment of a sovereign state for Sikhs, an ethnoreligious minority group in India," he said.

Czech authorities arrested and detained Gupta on June 30 in the Czech Republic through a bilateral extradition treaty between the US and the Czech Republic, according to the release.

It was not immediately clear when he might be brought to the United States.

The plot was directed by an Indian government agency employee who has described himself as a "senior field officer" with responsibilities in "security management" and "intelligence" and also claims to have served in India's Central Reserve Police Force [or CRPF] and been trained in "battle craft" and "weapons," the indictment said.

CRPF, is one of world's largest paramilitary forces, and India has deployed the force to quell pro-freedom struggle in disputed Kashmir, unrest in central and northeastern India.

Pannun was only identified in court papers as the "Victim."

The Indian government employee recruited Gupta last May to orchestrate the assassination, the indictment said.

Sensitive matter

The case is particularly sensitive given the high priority the administration of President Joe Biden has placed on improving ties with India and courting it to be a major partner in the push to counter China’s increasing assertiveness in the Asia-Pacific and beyond.

The White House declined to comment directly on the charges against Gupta, but said administration officials acted quickly.

"When we were made aware of the fact that the defendant, in this case, had credibly indicated that he was directed to arrange the murder by an individual who is assessed to be an employee of the Indian Government, we took this information very seriously and engaged in direct conversations with the Indian government at the highest levels to express our concern," White House National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement.

The White House first became aware of the plot in late July, according to a senior administration official.

The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive exchanges with the Indian government, said White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan met with his Indian counterpart, Ajit Doval, and underscored that India needed to investigate and hold those responsible accountable.

Sullivan also made clear that the US needed assurance that this would not happen again and warned that another episode could permanently damage the trust established between our two countries, the official said.

Biden then asked CIA Director William Burns to contact his counterpart and travel to India to make it clear that the United States would not tolerate such activities and that his administration expected accountability.

Biden also raised the matter directly with Prime Minister Narendra Modi when they met at the Group of 20 Summit in September in New Delhi.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Sullivan raised the issue with Minister of External Affairs S. Jaishankar when he visited Washington in September around the time of the annual UN General Assembly.

Camouflage

The indictment said Gupta contacted an individual he believed to be a criminal associate to help find a hitman to carry out the killing, but the individual happened to be a confidential source working with the DEA.

The confidential source then introduced Gupta to a purported hitman, who was actually a DEA agent, the indictment said.

In June, the Indian government employee gave Gupta the home address of Pannun, his phone numbers and details about his daily conduct, including surveillance photographs, which Gupta then passed along to the undercover DEA agent, the indictment said.

It said Gupta directed the undercover agent to carry out the murder as soon as possible, but also warned the agent not to commit the killing around the time of anticipated engagements between high-level US and Indian officials.

India had set up a high-level inquiry after US authorities raised concerns with New Delhi that its government may have had knowledge of a plot to kill a Sikh separatist leader on American soil, an Indian official said on Wednesday.

The US side shared some information, and India "takes such inputs seriously since they impinge on our national security interests as well, and relevant departments were already examining the issue," a statement by External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said.

In September, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said there were credible allegations that the Indian government agents may have had links to the assassination in that country of Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.

India rejected the accusation as absurd, but Canada expelled a top Indian diplomat, and India responded with the same measure.

According to the New York indictment unsealed on Wednesday, Gupta told the undercover DEA agent the day after Nijjar's murder that Nijjar "was also the target" and "we have so many targets", and he added that in light of Nijjar's murder, there was "now no need to wait" in carrying out the New York assassination.

Two days after Nijjar was killed, the Indian government official behind the New York assassination plot sent Gupta a news article about the New York assassination target and messaged Gupta that " (i)t's (a) priority now," the indictment said.