New York court allows legal papers to be sent through Delhi courts in civil lawsuit alleging assassination plot against US citizen; India rejects allegations.
A US federal court has cleared the way for Sikh separatist leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun to pursue service of a civil lawsuit against Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and former Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW) chief Samant Goel. This is through courts in Delhi. This case involves allegations of an assassination plot against a US citizen on American soil.
US District Judge Katherine Polk Failla of the Southern District of New York issued the order, allowing Pannun to use a mechanism under the Hague Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents. This allows him to transmit the legal papers through Indian courts.
Under the order, Pannun must submit a proposed service packet by Nov. 30. The court clerk would then transmit the documents to the identified Indian courts.
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The development marks another stage in a legal dispute that has brought allegations of foreign-directed violence against a US-based critic of the Indian government into the American judicial system. It also comes amid scrutiny of the US government’s investigation into an alleged 2023 conspiracy to kill Pannun in New York.
The American legal process and the November order
The lawsuit, Gurpatwant Singh Pannun v. The Government of India et al., was filed on September 17, 2024, in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York. Pannun, a US citizen of Indian origin and general counsel of Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), named the Government of India, Doval, Goel, Vikash Yadav, Nikhil Gupta and several unidentified individuals as defendants. He alleges that the defendants were involved in a conspiracy to assassinate him because of his advocacy for an independent Sikh state of Khalistan. The order addresses the specific question of how two Indian officials can be formally notified of the civil proceedings.
According to legal publication Bar and Bench, the court relied on Article 19 of the Hague Service Convention and provisions of India’s Code of Civil Procedure, including Section 29(c) and Order V Rule 21.
The court’s decision followed earlier unsuccessful attempts to serve the papers through India’s Central Authority, the Ministry of Law and Justice. It had also rejected other proposed methods, including email service on India’s attorney general and service through lawyers representing Yadav in a separate criminal case.
Importantly, the State Department had opposed the availability of diplomatic service under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, citing India’s reservation to Article 8 of the Hague Convention. The department took no position on the alternative route through Indian courts.
US State Department’s separate role
There is another important development in the case.
According to ThePrint, the US State Department had already transmitted a federal court summons to the Government of India through a diplomatic note delivered to the Indian Embassy in Washington, DC, on October 9, 2026. The note was signed on September 30. The department confirmed in an October 28 court filing that the summons had been delivered to the embassy.
That transmission concerned the Government of India as a defendant. It is separate from the order concerning service on Doval and Goel individually. The State Department also clarified that transmitting the documents did not indicate its position on the merits of the civil lawsuit. The distinction matters because the latest court order does not mean that Doval and Goel have already received the summons or that a court has found them responsible for the alleged conspiracy.
US criminal investigation provides the background
The civil lawsuit is linked to a separate US criminal investigation into an alleged plot to assassinate Pannun in New York in 2023. The US Department of Justice announced charges against Indian national Vikash Yadav on October 17, 2024, alleging that he directed a murder-for-hire conspiracy from India and recruited Nikhil Gupta to arrange the killing.
According to the indictment, Gupta contacted a person he believed was a criminal associate to arrange a contract killing. That person was actually a confidential source working with the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), who introduced him to an undercover officer posing as a hitman. The Justice Department alleged that Yadav agreed to pay $100,000 for the killing and that an associate delivered a $15,000 advance payment in Manhattan in June 2023.
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The indictment also alleged that Yadav supplied information about Pannun, including his New York address and details of his daily movements, to facilitate the planned attack.
On February 13, 2026, the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York announced that Gupta had pleaded guilty to three federal charges: murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire and conspiracy to commit money laundering. The Justice Department identified the intended victim as a US citizen of Indian origin who advocated for the secession of Punjab and led a US-based organization.
Yadav remains charged in the criminal case and has not been arrested in connection with those charges, according to the Justice Department’s February announcement. The criminal proceedings are separate from Pannun’s civil lawsuit. Gupta’s guilty plea does not establish the liability of Doval, Goel or the Government of India in the civil case.
India rejects the allegations
India’s Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has rejected the lawsuit and the allegations against its senior officials.
MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal described the case as “frivolous, fabricated and malicious” during a media briefing. Jaiswal also questioned the procedure for transmitting judicial documents to Indian officials, saying that requests for service in India must be routed through the country’s designated central authority, the Ministry of Law and Justice.
New Delhi’s objection introduces a procedural dimension to the dispute, as the US court has now accepted Pannun’s argument that Indian civil procedure permits foreign court summons to be transmitted to Indian courts under specified conditions. India’s response does not alter the order, but the next steps will depend on the proposed service packet and the subsequent transmission and handling of the documents by the Indian courts.
Implications for US-India relations
The case places the protection of American citizens from alleged transnational repression at the center of a sensitive US-India legal and diplomatic issue. The Biden administration had publicly described the alleged plot in 2024 as an attempt to assassinate a US citizen on American soil. The Justice Department’s prosecution has proceeded through criminal charges and cooperation with international law enforcement agencies. The case has also tested the relationship between Washington and New Delhi, particularly over allegations involving individuals linked by US prosecutors to Indian government employment.
India has maintained that it rejects the allegations against its officials. Following the initial US investigation, New Delhi announced an inquiry committee to examine information shared by American authorities.
For the US judicial system, the civil case now moves toward the formal notification of additional defendants. Whether the legal papers are successfully served, how the defendants respond and whether the litigation advances on its merits remain important developments to watch.
The order is a procedural decision, not a determination of responsibility. The underlying allegations against the Indian officials remain to be tested in court.