An assassination plot on American soil reveals a darker side of Modi’s India

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.

Tables on the South Lawn were decorated with lotus blooms, the symbol of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party. A chef was flown in from California to preside over a vegetarian menu. President Biden extolled the shared values of a relationship “built on mutual trust, candor and respect.”

But even as the Indian leader was basking in U.S. adulation on June 22, an officer in India’s intelligence service was relaying final instructions to a hired hit team to kill one of Modi’s most vocal critics in the United States.

The assassination is a “priority now,” wrote Vikram Yadav, an officer in India’s spy agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, or RAW, according to current and former U.S. and Indian security officials.

Yadav forwarded details about the target, Sikh activist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, including his New York address, according to the officials and a U.S. indictment. As soon as the would-be assassins could confirm that Pannun, a U.S. citizen, was home, “it will be a go ahead from us.”

Yadav’s identity and affiliation, which have not previously been reported, provide the most explicit evidence to date that the assassination plan — ultimately thwarted by U.S. authorities — was directed from within the Indian spy service.

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India’s assassination plots in the United States and Canada are part of an expanding wave of aggression against dissident groups seeking protection in other countries. Their home governments are increasingly willing to disregard the sovereignty of those nations and send agents across borders to subdue political enemies.

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.

Amid shifting geopolitical forces, the United States and other Western governments have struggled to stem this tide of repression. India has faced few consequences for its use of violence and intimidation against dissident groups, in part because the United States and its allies want closer ties with India in a new era of competition with China.

Cross-border repression takes various forms including violence, harassment and surveillance. India, which eclipsed China last year as the world’s most-populous country, is part of an expanding roster of dozens of nations now employing such tactics. As a result, sanctuary for dissident groups is shrinking on nearly every continent.

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