New Delhi: Nearly a year after Indian national Nikhil Gupta was arrested in the Czech Republic for an alleged plot to assassinate a US-based Khalistani separatist, India has now confirmed that a top Czech court has dismissed Gupta’s petition to stop his extradition to the US.
“Regarding Nikhil Gupta, we understand that the constitutional court in the Czech Republic has given a ruling upholding the earlier decisions of the courts on the admissibility of the extradition request,” External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in a response to a question during his weekly press briefing here Thursday. “Apart from that I don’t have more details.”
Gupta was allegedly involved in a conspiracy to assassinate Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a Khalistani separatist and the founder of Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), an organisation that has been banned in India and is considered a terrorist outfit by the Indian government. The Government of India declared Pannu a designated terrorist in 2020 and attached his agricultural land under Section 51A of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. He is facing 22 criminal cases, including three of sedition, in India.
The US federal prosecutors are also linking this conspiracy to the killing of Sikh extremist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in Canada last year. On June 19 last year, 45-year-old Nijjar, a leader of the Khalistan Tiger Force (KTF) and head of the Canadian arm of the SFJ, was shot dead in the parking lot of a gurdwara at Surrey in Vancouver, Canada.
A native of Harsinghpur in the Jalandhar district of Punjab, Nijjar reportedly worked as a plumber in Surrey, Canada. He was elected to head the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara in Surrey, Canada. He had visited Pakistan in 2013-14 to meet with Jagtar Singh Tara of KTF, who was arrested from Thailand in 2015, according to the Institute for Conflict Management.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) had designated Nijjar as a terrorist under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act in 2020 and had put a reward of Rs 10 lakh on his head.
Gupta, an Indian businessman, was arrested in the Czech Republic on June 30, 2023, at the request of the US. He was accused of conspiring to assassinate a US citizen by hiring a hitman. A subsequent indictment by US federal prosecutors alleged that Gupta was recruited by an Indian government official in a failed plot to target New York-based Pannun.
In January this year, the Czech high court in Prague dismissed Gupta’s appeal and ordered his extradition to the US. However, Gupta’s defence team took his case to the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic, seeking relief. The Constitutional Court has jurisdiction over complaints from individuals or entities regarding violations of their constitutionally guaranteed fundamental rights and freedoms by public authorities.
Gupta’s family had previously appealed to the Supreme Court in India, claiming that he had been mistreated in Czech prisons and his religious dietary beliefs had been violated.
So far, Gupta remains the sole accused mentioned in the unsealed indictment from November 2023, while the Indian government official involved remains unnamed. The exposure of the alleged plot has underscored the challenges faced by US authorities in protecting individuals who are politically contentious yet reside within its borders under lawful conditions.
This has also led to diplomatic complications between New Delhi and Washington. According to the Government of India, a high-level committee has been formed with US authorities to look into the entire matter.
When asked about what the members of the high-level committee and what it has found out about the alleged conspiracy, Jaiswal said: “The high-level committee has been constituted. And the high-level committee is looking into all the inputs that have been shared with us. Apart from that, I have nothing more to share with you.”
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