NEW DELHI (Diya TV) — The Indian government says 61 extradition requests from India to the United States have been pending for the last two decades. Among them, a few cases have charges of economic offenses, terrorism, and other serious crimes. New Delhi and Washington continue to exchange diplomatic courtesies, but the slow pace of extradition proceedings is of real concern to Indian officials.
The Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) says the majority of these petitions relate to high-profile fugitives in cases such as Mehul Choksi and Nirav Modi entering financial fraud cases. India’s authorities have continued challenging their extradition amid increasing public outrage over financial crimes.
Officials attribute the delays to the complicated legal systems of both countries and the due process protections given to individuals in the U.S. Legal practitioners also attribute the extraditions cases often taking a very long time to litigate due to how individuals who are being sought for extradition many times contest the request in the U.S. courts.
“While the bilateral extradition treaty between India and the U.S. is robust, the enforcement process is a hassle and time-consuming, as both nations give importance to the legal procedure,” observed an Indian official, requesting anonymity.
This is not the first time, however, that India has felt increasing frustration with such slow-moving extradition cases within the US-India relationship. Reports have been coming in even of delays in extradition requests sent to other countries. In recent times, India has gotten the same kind of response from Canada and the United Kingdom, whose shores have been open to Indians who have run to seek refuge there.
Issues of such a nature have been time and again raised at the highest levels by Indian officials to their counterparts in US meet, but the latter keeps reiterating the urgency required in these cases. Both countries will take this ahead as an important issue in their future diplomatic engagements in coming days as they continue to strengthen their economic and defense ties.
The MEA also said that steps would continue in streamlining the extradition process, with special focus on judicial cooperation and reduction in procedural delay.
