26/11 accused Tahawwur flown to India on special plane

New Delhi: Tahawwur Rana, an accused in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, is being brought to India in a special plane after he exhausted his legal options in the US, sources have said.

This comes after the US Supreme Court rejected Rana’s petition, requesting a stay on his extradition to India. “The application for stay addressed to The Chief Justice and referred to the Court is denied,” the Supreme Court order on Monday said.

The US Supreme Court had denied a similar request in March. Rana had earlier told the US court that he was suffering from an abdominal aortic aneurysm at immediate risk of rupture, Parkinson’s disease with cognitive decline, and a mass suggestive of bladder cancer. He had said he would not survive long enough to be tried in India. He had also alleged that he would be targeted in India due to national, religious, and cultural animosity.

In February, US President Donald Trump met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and announced in a joint press conference that Tahawwur Rana would face justice in India.

Rana is an associate of Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley, one of the key conspirators of the November 26 attacks in Mumbai in 2008. He is a Pakistani-origin businessman, physician, and immigration entrepreneur. He is learnt to have connections with terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, also known as ISI. “It is a challenge to keep a person like Tahawwur Rana in jail because whenever these people argue before a foreign country that we will not get justice in India, they say that their security and healthcare will be compromised in Indian jails and that the Indian jails are in poor condition,’ Former ADG Special Operations and Joint CP Mumbai Police, PK Jain said.

“Therefore, a special arrangement has been made in all the important jails called ‘Anda Cell’ (a high-security, egg-shaped complex within a jail which is used for solitary confinement). The same was done for Kasab because if such a person is killed or injured in jail, then it will prove a point in front of the whole world that Indian jails are not safe. “This will make it difficult for us to bring such an accused back to India in the future. Bringing him back to India proves that whoever commits terrorist acts against India, we will catch him even from hell.

“Secondly, a rogue nation like Pakistan, which nurtures and increases terrorism in the world, will be exposed once again. It is a matter of pride for us that a terrorist who has 1000% support of ISI and the Pakistani government, could bring him here to face the judicial system.”

The Mumbai police has said any decision on taking custody of the 26/11 accused Tahawwur Rana will depend on the specific grounds outlined in the extradition order once he is brought to India. According to reports, Rana is being extradited from the United States in connection with a conspiracy case registered by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in 2009 related to the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.