India's NIA registers case against Headley: Chidambaram

India's National Investigative Agency (NIA) has registered a case against David Coleman Headley, the Pakistan born American national who is in custody in the US for allegedly plotting terror attacks against India, Home Minister P. Chidambaram said on Thursday.

Headley's alleged accomplice Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin, has also been named in the case of the now foiled terror attacks plotted by the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) outfit, Chidambaram told reporters after the meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs. “He (Headley) visited India several times, once before and once after the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai. We are investigating in the cities where he went and whom he met,” the home minister said.

Intelligence shared by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) following the interrogation of Headley revealed that two of India's most prestigious boarding schools - Doon in Dehradun and Woodstock in Mussoorie - and the National Defence College in New Delhi were supposed targets of the LeT. Headley and Rana were arrested by the FBI last month. A team of intelligence officials from India's Research & Analysis Wing (RAW) and the Intelligence Bureau had flown into Washington on Nov 1 to question Headley.

The team was keen to find out if Headley was in touch with the masterminds of the LeT and if he attended any of the training camps that the 10 Pakistan-based terrorists went through for the 26/11 attack in Mumbai. Apparently, objections from the accused's lawyer questioning a foreign agency's involvement in the interrogation came in the way.

But Chidambaram said questioning Headley “was never on the agenda” of Indian investigators. “Indian officers went to Washington. It (questioning Headley in Chicago) was never on the agenda,” he said, adding they had gone there to conduct investigations and talk to FBI officials.