US Supreme Court rejects Tahawwur Rana’s plea, clears path for extradition to India in 26/11 case

The US Supreme Court has rejected Mumbai terror attack accused Tahawwur Hussain Rana's plea seeking a stay on his extradition to India, removing another hurdle in handing him over to Indian authorities for justice.

64-year-old Pakistani-origin Canadian citizen Rana is currently lodged in the Metropolitan Detention Centre in Los Angeles. He is associated with Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley, one of the main conspirators of the 26 November 2008 (26/11) attacks. Headley had conducted a recce of Mumbai as an employee of Rana's immigration consultancy before the attacks.

On February 27, Rana submitted an 'emergency application to stay the pending trial of the habeas corpus petition' before Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court and Circuit Judge of the Ninth Circuit Elena Kagan. Kagan rejected the application early last month.

Rana then renewed his application and requested that the renewed application be sent to Chief Justice Roberts. An order posted on the Supreme Court website said that Rana's renewed application was listed for a 'conference' on April 4, 2025 and the "application" has been "transmitted to the court." A notice on the Supreme Court website on Monday said, "The court has rejected the application." In which case was Rana convicted?

Rana was convicted in the US in a case related to assisting in a terrorist conspiracy in Denmark and in a case of assisting Pakistan-based terrorist organization Lashkar-e-Taiba, responsible for the Mumbai attacks. Ravi Batra, a famous Indian-American lawyer from New York, told PTI-Bhasha that Rana had applied to the Supreme Court to stop the extradition. This application was rejected by Justice Kagan on March 6. This application was presented before Roberts, "who shared it with the court so that the view of the whole court could be used."

In the emergency petition, Rana requested that the process of his extradition to India be stopped as long as the trial going on in the US is pending. He had sought to keep the petition filed on February 13 adjourned on its merits. In that petition, Rana argued It was that his extradition to India is a violation of US law and the 'United Nations Convention' against torture, "because there are sufficient grounds to believe that if he is extradited to India, the petitioner will be at risk of torture."

The petition said, "The possibility of torture in this case is even more because the petitioner is a Muslim of Pakistani origin accused in the Mumbai attacks." The petition also said that due to his 'serious medical condition', extraditing him to Indian detention centres is 'de facto' a death sentence in this case. On January 21, the US Supreme Court rejected the application related to Rana's original habeas corpus petition in which he sought a review of the lower court's decision.

The application said that on the same day, newly appointed Secretary of State Marco Rubio met External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. When Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Washington to meet Trump on February 12, Rana's lawyer received a letter from the State Department, stating that the Secretary of State had decided on February 11, 2025, to approve the extradition of Rana to India following the Extradition Treaty between the United States and India.

During a joint press conference with Prime Minister Modi at the White House in February, President Donald Trump said his administration had approved the extradition of the "very evil" Rana, who is wanted by Indian law enforcement agencies for his role in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack. A total of 166 people, including six Americans, were killed in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. These attacks were carried out by 10 Pakistani terrorists.