By David Ingram and Andrew MacAskill
NEW YORK/NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Prime Minister Narendra Modi kicked off his maiden visit to the United States as India?s leader on Friday facing an unwelcome reminder of his once strained relations with his host nation: a lawsuit alleging he failed to stop anti-Muslim rioting in 2002.
Washington and New Delhi brushed off the suit brought in a U.S. court on the eve of Modi's arrival, saying it would not affect the visit that includes meetings with President Barack Obama and an address at the United Nations General Assembly.
The Indian government called the lawsuit, filed on Thursday in a New York federal court by a little-known human rights group called American Justice Center, a "frivolous and malicious attempt to distract attention" from Modi's visit.
It appears unlikely that the suit will have any serious legal consequences.
Modi and the Indian government could seek to have the suit dismissed, and a senior U.S. official briefing reporters on the visit stressed that heads of government enjoyed immunity from U.S. legal suits.
In June a U.S. judge dismissed a similar suit filed last year against Sonia Gandhi, the leader of India's Congress Party, saying the plaintiffs failed to state a legitimate claim. The suit claimed she helped organise anti-Sikh riots in 1984 following the assassination of her mother, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, by Sikh bodyguards.
The president of the American Justice Center acknowledged the Modi lawsuit did not have good chances.
"The symbolism is the victory," Joseph Whittington told reporters in New York. Whittington, a city council member in Harvey, Illinois, said some of his constituents were refugees from the violence that swept parts of the western Indian state of Gujarat in 2002.
Nevertheless, the lawsuit casts some doubt over Modi's carefully nurtured image as a modernising reformist who can rescue India's ailing economy. He has been largely successful in that effort and since his election triumph in May, the Indian media's focus has largely shifted toward what he can do for India rather than what his critics say he failed to do as chief minister of Gujarat 12 years ago.
Until recently, Modi was not welcome in the United States because of the riots. Some 1,000 people, most of them Muslims, died in a wave of reprisal attacks across Gujarat after a train carrying Hindu pilgrims was set on fire.
Modi, a Hindu nationalist, has long faced accusations of looking the other way during the violence but he has denied the accusations and was exonerated in an Indian Supreme Court inquiry in 2012.
The lawsuit seeks compensatory and punitive damages from Modi for crimes against humanity and extrajudicial killings. Modi or his lawyer will have 21 days to respond once he is served the papers.
The lawyer representing the American Justice Center, a non-profit organization formed to sue on behalf of India's religious minorities, told a news conference in New York it was offering a $10,000 cash reward to anyone would serve court papers on Modi.
AN ATTEMPT TO EMBARRASS
Compared with other foreign powers, Washington was slow to warm to Modi, with its ambassador to India only meeting him in February when opinion polls put the Hindu nationalist leader on course to win.
Modi, 64, was denied a U.S. visa in 2005 under the terms of a 1998 U.S. law that bars entry to foreigners who have committed "particularly severe violations of religious freedom."
Modi looks to close that chapter this week with his meetings with Obama and other U.S. officials, and analysts expect him to be little fazed by the lawsuit.
"This is certainly an attempt by one activist group to embarrass Mr. Modi," said Dhruva Jaishankar, a fellow at the German Marshall Fund. "I do believe, however, that neither government will let this derail their official interactions.
However, Modi faces being dogged by protests even as he is expected to be warmly welcomed by much of India's large community in the United States. An event planned at New York's Madison Square Garden is expected to draw the largest crowd ever by a foreign leader on U.S. soil.
A group called the Alliance for Justice and Accountability is calling for people to picket the venue and wave black flags in protest. Another group, the Sikhs for Justice that filed the Gandhi suit, will convene a 'Citizen's Court' where they will indict Modi at a park in front of the White House when he meets Obama.
(Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in Washington and Joseph Ax and Nate Raymond in New York; Writing by Tomasz Janowski, editing by Ross Colvin)
