Is India a banana republic or some sort of seriously dysfunctional state where a senior officer working for the country’s top intelligence agency can plan an assassination on American soil without his superiors knowing and approving the ‘mission’? This is the question the Modi government needs to answer as it ponders over its response to the Washington Post’s latest story on the plot to kill New York-based Khalistan campaigner Gurpatwant Singh Pannun.

Though Pannun is accused of various offences in India and has also been designated a terrorist by the Indian government, the Ministries of External Affairs and Home Affairs have made no attempts to get the United States to extradite him. However, according to a US federal indictment unsealed last November against an Indian citizen, Nikhil Gupta, a senior intelligence official in Delhi sought to have Pannun killed.

The indictment deliberately chose to keep the official’s name hidden though the description of his duties in India made it clear that he worked for the Research and Analysis Wing, India’s external spy agency. Through its reporting, the Washington Post has now named the official as........

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