The case of pro-Khalistani separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun’s failed murder plot has once again sprung back into focus. The US Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York, revealed on Friday (US time) that accused Nikhil “Nick” Gupta has admitted to the charges against him despite previously pleading “not guilty” in the case. 

Appearing in a US court this week, Gupta, who is an Indian national, pled guilty to all three counts contained in the Second Superseding Indictment, charging him with murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire, and conspiracy to commit money laundering, in connection with his attempts to murder Pannun in 2023, who is a dual US-Canadian citizen. 

54-year-old Gupta has long been accused of working in cahoots with a former Indian Government employee, who was listed as “CC-1” and a “Senior Field Officer” with responsibilities in “Security Management” and “Intelligence” in a Superseding Indictment unsealed in November 2023. The February 13, 2026, update citing the Second Superseding Indictment in the case has since formally named the co-defendant as Vikash Yadav.

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Gupta’s foiled murder plot (alongside Yadav) is primarily attributed to a case of multiple mistaken identities, which helped US authorities bring him down. Unbeknownst to himself, Gupta ended up enlisting a “hitman” through someone he believed to be a “criminal associate.” However, neither of the two people had any criminal affiliations. Both were actually US law enforcement officials. 

Who is Nikhil Gupta?

“I agreed with another person to have another individual to murder (sic) a person in the United States,” Nikhil admitted, as per the transcript of his Feb 13 plea hearing reported by Reuters. He also confessed to paying someone $15,000 in New York to commit the crime.

While certain Indian reports have previously identified him as a businessman, the US Justice Department sticks to saying he is “citizen and was a resident of India.”  

FBI Assistant Director Roman Rozhavsky described Gupta as a “key participant in a murder-for-hire plot against a U.S. citizen.” Meanwhile, DEA Administrator Terrance Cole called him an “international narcotics and weapons trafficker,” as per the official press release by the US Justice Department (DOJ). 

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The US Attorney’s Office statement underlined in the new press release states, “he has described himself as an international narcotics and weapons trafficker in electronic communications with Yadav and others.”

According to US authorities, Gupta was recruited by the former Indian government official to orchestrate the assassination of Pannun in the United States. Given the severity of all the charges he is now facing, Gupta could face a maximum sentence of 40 years. 

About Nikhil Gupta’s arrest and extradition

The November 2023 indictment details that Gupta was arrested on or about June 30, 2023, in the Czech Republic at the request of US authorities in connection with the Pannun case. Thereafter, the US Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs worked in collaboration with Czech authorities to secure his June 2024 extradition to America. He has since remained in custody in Brooklyn.

During his time in the US prison (when he had plead “not guilty”), the Indian national gave an interview to India’s newspaper, The Sunday Guardian, in August 2024. Speaking from his Metropolitan Detention Centre cell, he pressed at the time that he was an innocent man who had been framed.

Despite now admitting to his involvement in the attempted assassination, he claimed then that the case was meant to affect elections in India.

Nikhil Gupta’s ties with Vikash Yadav explored

As per the official indictment records shared by the US Justice Department, Gupta reached out to an individual (listed as “CS”) whom he believed to be a criminal associate, at Yadav’s direction. However, the enlisted person was, in reality, a confidential source working with the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). 

Gupta called on the individual for assistance in contracting a person to murder Pannun in New York City, as per the DOJ. Thereafter, CS introduced Gupta to a purported “hitman,” who was also actually an undercover DEA officer (the “UC”).

After their dealings, Yadav agreed to pay the UC $100,000 to kill the pro-Khalistani activist in New York. As per the DOJ, Gupta arranged for an associate to hand over $15,000 in cash to the UC in Manhattan, on or about June 9, 2023, as an advance payment for the assassination plot.

Yadav and Gupta are said to have continued being in touch throughout the month of June 2023. During their stated interactions, Vikash gave personal information about Pannun to Nikhil, according to the indictment. These disclosures included the separatist activist’s NYC home address, phone numbers, and other details about his daily routine. The DOJ states that Gupta then relayed the information to the UC. 

While Gupta is said to have pushed the UC to carry out the murder as soon as possible, DOJ’s documents establish that he also pressed the UC not to commit the killing around the anticipated schedule of high-level meetings between Indian and US government officials in America. As is now known, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s official state visit to the US was scheduled to begin on or about June 20, 2023. 

The DOJ’s press release also, in a way, links Gupta to the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a leader of the pro-Khalistani movement based in Canada, which took place just days before PM Modi’s US visit. Nijjar was killed by masked gunmen outside a Sikh temple in British Columbia, Canada, on June 18, 2023. 

In light of Nijjar’s death, Gupta told the UC that he “was also the target” among many others like Pannun, as per the US Attorney’s Office and DOJ. He also instructed the UC to immediately carry out Pannun’s murder as there was “now no need to wait.”

India government on Nikhil Gupta

Indian authorities have long distanced themselves from the assassination plot, refuting allegations linked to the case as “unwarranted. 

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While officials are now said to be studying the legal implication of Gupta’s guilty plea in a case involving allegations about Research and Analytical Wing (RAW) agent Vikash Yadav, sources told the Deccan Herald that the Government of India maintains that it had nothing to do with the plot. 

Back in 2024, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said, “There is an ongoing investigation of the high-level committee set up by the Government of India to look into the security concerns shared by the U.S. government on networks of organised criminals, terrorists and others.” The Indian authorities also repeatedly reiterated that it is not “government policy” to conduct such transnational killings even as allegations dragged the government into claims of Nijjar’s murder in Canada, which also were denied.

The same year, the MEA spokesperson addressed allegations raised regarding Vikash Yadav. “The US State Department informed us that the individual mentioned in the indictment is no longer employed by India. I confirm that he is no longer an employee of the Government of India,” he said at the time. 

Moreover, the Indian government even addressed Gupta’s 2024 extradition in a statement issued that year, when Gupta had initially pleaded “not guilty.” Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal stated at the time, “We have so far not received any request for consular access from Mr. Gupta, but his family has got in touch with us, and we are in touch with the family members, and we are looking at the matter, as to what can be done.”