WASHINGTON: One ‘Rahul’ appears to have been the main target of Chicago resident David Coleman Headley, arrested by the FBI for planning to carry out a major terrorist attack in India this month at the behest of Lashkar-i-Taiba, the Press Trust of India reported. 

Headley, 49, made several trips to India and intended to stay there for two to four weeks to execute the LT plans, US investigators were quoted by the PTI as saying.

Headley was arrested, along with a Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin, earlier this month by the FBI’s joint terrorism task force at Chicago Airport before he boarded a flight to Philadelphia, intending to travel to Pakistan.

According to an affidavit filed by the FBI in a Chicago court, Headley, in an e-mail on July 8 to a senior leader, whose name has not been revealed but who has been identified as ‘LT individual A’, said: ‘I think when we get a chance we should revisit our last location again and say Hi to Rahul.’

Following his arrest, Headley said the reference was to a prominent Indian actor with that first name, the FBI said in its complaint.

Intelligence sources in New Delhi discounted speculation that the reference could have been to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. In such cases, US security agencies would immediately alert their Indian counterparts, but there was no such alert, the sources said.