US court postpones sentencing of Nikhil Gupta, who pleaded guilty in plot to kill Khalistani leader

Nikhil Gupta, who pleaded guilty in a failed assassination plot targeting American Sikh activist and Khalistan movement leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, was due to be sentenced on May 29.

But court records show that, two months after the date was set by a US district court in New York, Gupta’s request to adjourn his sentencing was granted in April. He will now be sentenced on September 25.

Gupta is expected to receive a prison sentence of at least 19 years.

Earlier this year, on February 13, the US Attorney’s Office announced that Gupta had pleaded guilty in what prosecutors claimed was a “murder-for-hire plot” orchestrated by an Indian government employee who worked for India’s cabinet secretariat. India’s foreign intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, is a wing of the cabinet secretariat.

Gupta, a 54-year-old Indian national whom US prosecutors described as an international narcotics and weapons trafficker, was allegedly tasked with arranging Pannun’s killing in New York in 2023.

According to the US Attorney’s Office, Gupta was charged with three counts: murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

India has repeatedly denied directing the plot, maintaining that such actions are contrary to government policy.

What was the case?

US federal prosecutors claim that the plot began in May 2023 when Vikash Yadav, an employee of India’s cabinet secretariat, allegedly recruited Gupta to arrange for Pannun to be assassinated in New York. US authorities later claim to have identified Yadav as a former Indian intelligence officer.

Prosecutors allege Gupta contacted a man he believed to be a criminal associate to find a hitman. The man was, in fact, a confidential source working with the US Drug Enforcement Administration. This source subsequently introduced Gupta to an undercover Drug Enforcement Administration agent posing as a contract killer.

US authorities allege that Yadav, acting through Gupta, agreed to pay $100,000 for Pannun’s murder. As part of the arrangement, an associate allegedly delivered $15,000 in cash as an advance payment in June 2023.

Prosecutors say Gupta and Yadav also provided detailed information about Pannun, including his New York address, phone numbers, daily routine and surveillance photographs, while urging that the killing be carried out as quickly as possible.

Court filings further allege that Gupta instructed the undercover agent not to carry out the assassination during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s state visit to the United States in June 2023, apparently to avoid drawing attention to the operation.

However, after Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar was shot dead outside a gurdwara in Canada’s British Columbia on June 18, 2023, Gupta allegedly told the undercover agent in the US that there was “now no need to wait” before killing Pannun.

On June 30, though, before Gupta could act, he was arrested in the Czech Republic by the US federal authorities, extradited to the US a year later by the Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs, and has been in federal custody as the case proceeded.

On February 13, Gupta pleaded guilty to all three charges against him. Prosecutors have described the case as an attempt by a foreign government actor to silence a critic on American soil. Yadav has also been charged by US authorities but has not been arrested.

FBI Assistant Director in Charge James C Barnacle Jr in a press release in February said that Gupta “at the direction and coordination of an Indian government employee” had “...plotted to assassinate a United States citizen on American soil”.

Gupta was “facilitating a foreign adversary’s unlawful effort to silence a vocal critic of the Indian government”, the press release said.

After the allegations became public in 2023, New Delhi established a high-level inquiry committee to examine evidence shared by American authorities. In January 2025, India’s Ministry of Home Affairs said the panel had recommended legal action against an unidentified individual whose criminal links emerged during the investigation.

But it did not identify the individual nor did it acknowledge any government role in the matter.

However, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation has explicitly identified the government official

at the centre of the allegations as Vikash Yadav. He has have added to the FBI’s “most wanted” list.

The Indian Ministry of External Affairs has said that Yadav was no longer a government employee.

This was not the only illegal action Yadav was alleged to have been involved in. A businessman in Delhi alleged that Yadav is linked to the Indian gangster, Lawrence Bishnoi.

On the basis of this complaint, Yadav was arrested by the Delhi Police Special Cell in December 2023, soon after Gupta was arrested by the American authorities. Yadav was accused of kidnapping, extortion and attempted murder.

As for Gupta, following his guilty plea earlier this year, the Indian government maintained that he was a “private individual” with no connection to any Indian official or intelligence agency.

It remains unclear why Gupta’s defence team sought an adjournment of his sentencing. Neither US federal authorities nor the Indian government have publicly commented on the postponement.