Report Names RAW Officer Who 'Hired Hit Team' To Kill Sikh Separatist Leader Pannun In US

Pannun 'Assassination Plot': MEA has not made any comments on the Washington Post report that says it interviewed over 30 officials during its investigation.

File photo of Sikh Separatist Leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun.

Source : Facebook/@gurpatwant.pannun.7

The previously reported assassination plan of Sikh separatist leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a US citizen and vocal critic of the Indian government, was allegedly directed from within India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), The Washington Post has said in an exclusive investigative report published on Monday. The report, as part of its series, Repression's Long Arm, has revealed what it calls “most explicit evidence to date” about the alleged assassination plot.

The report based on interviews with more than 30 senior officials, both current and former, in the US, the UK, Canada, Germany, Australia, and India, revealed the identity of the RAW officer allegedly involved in the reported assassination plot of Pannun, and that of Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar, who was gunned down in Canada.

The report said the officer gave instructions to a “hired hit team” to kill Pannun on US soil.

“The assassination is a ‘priority now’…,” the office reportedly said, according to the Post report that quoted current and former US and Indian security officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The report said MEA officials did not respond to the Post’s queries seeking comments on the matter. 

“We are not making any comments,” MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal told ABP LIVE.

The Centre had in 2020 declared Pannun, the founder of Sikh For Justice (SFJ), a “designated individual terrorist”. 

The Case So Far

In June 2023, Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar (45), declared a terrorist by India, was shot dead by two gunmen outside a gurdwara near Vancouver. India denied any involvement in the killing.

In November, US prosecutors indicted an Indian citizen, Nikhil Gupta, of collaborating with an Indian government official in a plot to assassinate Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, who holds dual citizenship of the US and Canada, in the US. The indictment also mentioned an Indian official, referred to as CC-1, who allegedly issued the direction to kill Pannun.

‘CC-1’ is the officer whose identity has now been revealed in the Post’s report.

Quoting documents, the report also said US intel officials assessed that the Pannun plot had the approval of then RAW chief, which it said was corroborated by the accounts provided by former senior Indian security officials privy to the operation.

According to the report, US spy agencies have “more tentatively” assessed that National Security Adviser Ajit Doval could have been aware of the plans.

It said a private meeting took place between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden in New Delhi in September 2023 (India hosted the G20 Summit that month), when the US is understood to have said that it would not take any punitive action but asked India to hold accountable those responsible for the alleged assassination plot. 

In March this year, Bloomberg reported that the Indian government submitted to the US authorities a report about their findings from a probe into the “failed assassination attempt”.

Quoting officials, the Post report said RAW agents have in the past faced “arrest, expulsion and reprimand” in Australia, Germany and Britain, but the actions were not made public.