IB, RAW officials to question LeT operative arrested in Chicago

This October 27, 2009 picture shows the grocery store owned by Tahawar Rana on Chicago's Devon Avenue. Federal officials unsealed criminal complaints against Rana and one David Coleman Headley, who was arrested by the FBI earlier this month at the Chicago airport. Headley intended to travel to India to execute the LeT plans, according to U.S. investigators.

With the aim of unravelling the entire conspiracy hatched by Lashkar-e-Taiba to carry out attacks here, a team of Indian intelligence officials will travel to the U.S. next week to question David Coleman Headley, an operative of the outfit arrested there.

The team, comprising officials of Intelligence Bureau (IB) and Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) will attempt to extract information about the LeT plot, official sources said.

“We are working with the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation of the U.S.) to follow up what needs to be done in India while they are investigating what needs to be done in the U.S.,” Home Minister P. Chidambaram told reporters here.

He said the FBI has shared with India the documents, like the complaint and affidavit filed by it in the court, a little while before it was made public.

Sources said the U.S. has sought the cooperation of India to corroborate the information provided by Headley, who was arrested by the FBI earlier this month at the Chicago airport while he was going to board a flight to Philadelphia with final destination being Pakistan.

The 49-year-old Headley intended to travel to India for some time — two to four weeks — to execute the LeT plans, according to U.S. investigators.

The FBI, in its criminal complaint, has concluded that since the beginning of 2009 LeT was placing a high priority on using Headley to assist in planning a new attack in India.

According to the FBI affidavit filed in a Chicago court, Headley was in close contact with Ilyas Kashmiri and several unidentified leaders of LeT.

Kashmiri is the operational chief of the Pakistan-occupied Kashmir section of Harakat-ul Jihad Islami (HuJI), a Pakistan-based terrorist organisation having links with the al-Qaeda.

Headley, who had changed his name to Daood Gilani in 2006 so that there is less suspicion during his travels to India and Pakistan, was arrested along with the Pakistani-Canadian Tahawar Rana, also a resident of Chicago.

The team of Indian investigators will also try to get information about 48-year-old Rana, the sources said.