India’s intelligence service has aggressively targeted Indian diaspora populations in Asia, Europe and North America, officials said.
The White House went to extraordinary lengths last year to welcome Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a state visit meant to bolster ties with an ascendant power and potential partner against China.
The Washington Post is investigating a global surge in these campaigns of cross-border repression, as well as the global forces leading India and other nations to employ tactics normally associated with the world’s most repressive governments. For this story, Post reporters conducted dozens of interviews with officials, experts and targeted individuals in New Delhi, Washington, Ottawa, London, Prague and Berlin.
In reports that have been closely held within the American government, U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that the operation targeting Pannun was approved by the RAW chief at the time, Samant Goel. That finding is consistent with accounts provided to The Washington Post by former senior Indian security officials who had knowledge of the operation and said Goel was under extreme pressure to eliminate the alleged threat of Sikh extremists overseas. U.S.
The revelations have added to Western concerns about Modi, whose tenure has been marked by economic growth and rising global stature for India, but also deepening authoritarianism. A recent report by Freedom House, a human rights organization, listed India among the world’s practitioners of “transnational repression,” a term for governments’ use of intimidation or violence against their own citizens — dissidents, activists, journalists — in others’ sovereign territory.
For the Biden administration, which has spent three years cultivating closer ties with India, the assassination plots have pitted professed values against strategic interests. Even in recent days, the Biden administration has taken steps to contain the fallout from the assassination plot. White House officials warned the Modi government this month that The Post was close to publishing an investigation that would reveal new details about the case. It did so without notifying The Post.For decades, RAW was regarded as a regional player, preoccupied by proxy wars with Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence spy agency.
Attempts by The Post to locate or contact Yadav were unsuccessful. A former Indian security official said he was transferred back to the Central Reserve Police Force after the Pannun plot unraveled. The two were discussing “another potential firearms and narcotics transaction,” according to the affidavit when, on May 30, Gupta abruptly asked “about the possibility of hiring someone to murder a lawyer living in New York.”
Hours after Nijjar was gunned down in his car on June 18 outside the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara temple in Surrey, Yadav sent a video clip to Gupta “showing Nijjar’s bloody body slumped in his vehicle,” according to the indictment.draw him out of India and into a friendly jurisdiction, U.S.
As RAW chief at the time, Goel was “under pressure” to neutralize the alleged threat posed by Sikh extremists overseas, said a former Indian security official. Goel reported to Doval, and had ties to the hard-line national security adviser going back decades. Former Indian officials who know both men said Goel would not have proceeded with assassination plots in North America without the approval of his superior and protector.
In Australia, two RAW officers were expelled in 2020 after authorities broke up what Mike Burgess, head of the Australian intelligence service, described as a “nest of spies.” A U.S. State Department human rights report released this month catalogued India’s alleged engagement in transnational repression. It cited credible accounts of “extraterritorial killing, kidnapping, forced returns or other violence,” as well as “threats, harassment, arbitrary surveillance and coercion” of overseas dissidents and journalists.
whose leaders included Pannun and Nijjar — sought to rekindle the movement with unofficial referendums on Sikh statehood and with protests that at times have seemed to glorify violence. A parade in Canada last year included a float depicting Indira Gandhi’s assassination, and Khalistan supporters have stormed and defaced Indian diplomatic facilities in Western cities.
In an interview with The Post, Pannun denied engaging in terrorism and said he was targeted because of his activism on behalf of Sikhs. “They wanted to assassinate me so they can stop the ongoing Khalistan referendum movement for the secession of Punjab from Indian occupation,” he said.Modi has been dismissive. “If a citizen of ours has done anything good or bad, we are ready to look into it,” he said in an interview with the Financial Times published in late December.
the “professional” killing of Khalistanis outside India’s borders. Among those killed was Paramjit Singh Panjwar, 63, a leader of a militant group called the Khalistan Commando Force, who was shot dead last May near a park in Lahore by two gunmen who fled on motorcycle, according to media reports.Even as the alleged RAW assassination plots reached their final stages, officials in both the United States and Canada remained unaware of the full dimensions of the conspiracy.
Those assembled confronted evidence of a grave violation of U.S. sovereignty by a nation seen as increasingly indispensable in the global competition with China. After weeks of deliberations, administration officials settled on a plan they hoped would ward off future plots without causing deeper ruptures with India.
A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment on the India case, saying it is an “ongoing matter.” Relations between the countries went into a tailspin. Canada withdrew 41 diplomats from India after Modi’s government threatened to revoke their legally protected status. Canadian officials who traveled to New Delhi for meetings with Doval and others said they were greeted with denials of Indian involvement and lectures on alleged Sikh terrorism.
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