India not ‘unsatisfied’ if Headley gets life: Pillai

NEW DELHI - Home Secretary G.K. Pillai Friday said India will not be unsatisfied if David Headley, a key conspirator of the 2008 Mumbai terror attack, is sentenced to life imprisonment.

All that we know (is) that Headley has pleaded guilty to 12 charges. In one sense it is good, Pillai said on the sidelines of a lecture on India-Bangladesh security at the Observer Research Foundation here.

He said the government had learnt that the US attorney general had advised life imprisonment for Headley.

I don’t think government of India will be unsatisfied, Pillai added.

Asked about the possibility of India getting a chance to interrogate Headley, he said there was some mention that foreign judicial custody could be allowed. The home secretary added that India has to work it out with the US agencies.

Is India upset that it could not get Headley’s custody? Pillai said that saying anything more now will be only speculation.

Headley pleaded guilty in a Chicago court Thursday to a dozen federal terrorism charges and admitted his role in planning the gory Nov 26, 2008 attack in Mumbai that left 166 people dead.