New Delhi, Apr 12 (PTI) The Congress on Saturday claimed the extradition of Mumbai terror attack mastermind Tahawwur Hussain Rana from the US is the result of 15 years of hard work “of our probe agencies”.

About BJP leaders crediting Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the development, Congress’ Pawan Khera sought to know whether they would also credit him for not getting Dawood Ibrahim, David Headley, Mehul Choksi and others, wanted by Indian agencies, extradited.

“Today, there is a race to ensure that the credit for the extradition of Tahawwur Rana in some way or other goes to Narendra Modi and only Narendra Modi. This extradition is the result of 15 years of hard work by our agencies,” he said in a video statement posted on X.

Explaining the chronology of events, Khera said that in October 2009, Tahawwur Rana and David Headley were nabbed in Denmark’s Copenhagen while planning for a terror attack, and it was revealed then that they were responsible for the conspiracy of Mumbai terror attacks.

Headley is a co-conspirator of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack.

The then UPA government booked them under various acts, he said, adding that in November 2009, the Canadian government provided India with a lot of inputs.

“But when, as per American law, they were acquitted in the Mumbai terror attacks, the UPA government publicly expressed anguish at the time,” Khera said.

“The people who give credit to Narendra Modi for the extradition of Tahawwur Rana, I want to ask those people whether they would give credit to Modi for not getting the extradition of Dawood Ibrahim, David Headley, Mehul Choksi, Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi,” the Congress leader asked.

He said whenever anything happens against India’s interests, the Congress will stand with the BJP government to protect the interests of the country.

Escorted by NIA officials, Rana, a 64-year-old Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin, reached Delhi on Thursday evening on a chartered aircraft after his extradition from the US, ending a 16-year-long wait to prosecute one of the key accused in the 2008 deadly Mumbai attack in which 166 people were killed and over 238 injured.

Later in the night, he was produced before a Delhi court that granted the NIA his 18-day custody.

Rana, who is a close associate of 26/11 main conspirator David Coleman Headley alias Daood Gilani, a US citizen, is accused of conspiring with the latter and operatives of designated terrorist organisations Lashkar-e-Taiba and Harkat-ul-Jihadi Islami along with other Pakistan-based co-conspirators, to carry out the three-day terror siege of India’s financial capital. PTI SKC NSD NSD