Balwinder Singh gets 15 yrs for plotting terror attacks in India
A 42-year-old Indian in the US has been sentenced to 15 years in jail for plotting terror attacks in India by providing material support and resources to the Khalistan movement.
Balwinder Singh was a member of two terrorist groups and provided material support to “intimidate” the Indian government and harm persons who were not supporting the terrorism groups’ cause, said US attorney Daniel Bogden for the district of Nevada . Singh was sentenced by US district judge Larry Hicks in Reno to 180 months in prison on Tuesday, Bogden said.
“This case is an example of multi-law enforcement agencies working collaboratively together to protect the United States and our foreign allies from a terrorist act,” Bogden added.
Singh, who also went by the alias Jhaji and Baljit Singh, is a citizen of India and a permanent US resident. He had pleaded guilty in November last year.
According to court documents, between September and December 2013, Singh conspired with others to support terrorist attacks in India as part of the Khalistan movement to create an independent Sikh state in the Punjab region.
In October 2013, Singh and his co-conspirators agreed that one of them would travel to India and carry out a terror attack “likely an assassination or maiming of an Indian governmental official.”
In November 2013, Singh purchased two sets of night vision goggles and a laptop and provided these items to a co-conspirator. The co-conspirator attempted to board a flight from the San Francisco International Airport to Bangkok in December 2013 in order to carry out the attack but US law enforcement prevented him. After these events, Singh and his co-conspirators continued to plan the terror attack in India until Singh’s arrest in December 2013.