An Indian former officer accused by the US of masterminding a murder-for-hire plot has rejected the charges, with his family expressing surprise that Vikas Yadav was wanted by the FBI. When Yadav, 39, spoke to his cousin Avinash Yadav, he dismissed the claims as false media reports, the relative told Reuters on Saturday in his native village, about 100 km from Delhi.
The US Justice Department accused Yadav of leading a failed plot to assassinate Khalistani terrorist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun last year. According to the indictment unsealed on Thursday, Yadav was an officer of the Research and Analysis Wing spy service.
India, which has said it is investigating the allegations, said Yadav is no longer a government employee, without saying whether he was an intelligence officer.
“The family has no knowledge of him working for the spy agency,” Yadav’s cousin said in Pranapura village in Haryana state. Despite the two speaking to each other regularly, “he never mentioned anything about it.”
“For us he is still working for the CRPF,” said Avinash Yadav, 28, of the federal Central Reserve Police Force, which he joined in 2009. “He told us he was the deputy commandant” and that he was trained as a paratrooper.
The cousin said he did not know where Yadav was but he lived with his wife and daughter born last year.
Indian officials have not commented on Yadav’s whereabouts. The Washington Post, citing US officials, reported on Thursday that Yadav is still in India and the US is expected to seek his extradition.
His 65-year-old mother Sudesh Yadav said she was still in shock. “What can I say? I don’t know if the US government is telling the truth.”
“He is working for the country,” he said.
The US has accused Yadav of instructing another Indian national, Nikhil Gupta, who is accused of paying a hitman $15,000 to kill Pannun.
But in Pranapura, Yadav’s cousin pointed to the family’s modest, one-storey house and asked, “Where will this much money come from? Can you see any Audis and Mercedes outside this house?”
Locals said most of the village’s approximately 500 families traditionally send youth to join the security forces.
Yadav’s father, who died in 2007, was an officer in India’s Border Force until he died in 2007, Avinash Yadav said, and his brother works with police in Haryana.
Another cousin, 41-year-old Amit Yadav, said Vikas Yadav was a quiet boy, interested in books and athletics and was a national-level shooter.
“Only the Indian government and Vikas know what happened,” he said, adding that Indian authorities should inform them.
Amit Yadav said, if the government “discards” a paramilitary officer, who will work for him?
Avinash Yadav said, “We want the Indian government to support us, they should tell us what has happened. Otherwise where will we go?”
