Whether the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act's commercial activity exception, 28 U.S.C. § 1605(a)(2), requires a foreign state to have performed a legally significant act in the United States to establish direct effect jurisdiction, and if so, what standard should govern the determination of what constitutes such a legally significant act

No question identified. : APPLICATION FOR EXTENSION OF TIME TO FILE A PETITION FOR A WRIT OF CERTIORARI To: Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, Circuit Justice for the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit: Under this Court’s Rules 13.5 and 22, Applicant Arun Kumar Bhattacharya (“Applicant”) respectfully requests an extension of thirty (30) days to file a petition for a writ of certiorari. The forthcoming petition will seek review of the decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Bhattacharya v. State Bank of India, 70 F.4th 941 (7th Cir. 2023), a copy of which is attached to this application. In support of this application, Applicant states the following: 1. The Seventh Circuit issued its opinion on June 12, 2023. Without an extension, the petition for a writ of certiorari will be due on September 11, 2023. With the requested extension of thirty (30) days, the petition would be due on October 11, 2023. Consistent with Rule 13.5, the instant application is filed more than ten (10) days before the petition for certiorari is currently due. This Court’s jurisdiction will be based on 28 U.S.C. § 1254(1). 2. Applicant has retained the undersigned to act as counsel of record in the Supreme Court only after the Seventh Circuit issued its judgment, and counsel of record has multiple, competing obligations around the time that the petition is currently due. The requested extension is thus needed to permit the undersigned counsel to fully investigate the legal questions involved in the case, and to prepare a petition for certiorari that crystalizes and addresses those issues worthy of the Court’s consideration. 3. Applicant requests only half the time otherwise permitted under Rule 13.5 for extensions of time to file a petition for certiorari (as noted above, Applicant requests only a 30-day extension, although extensions of up to 60 days may be granted). For the following reasons, Applicant respectfully submits that the requested extension should be granted. 4. In the decision below, the Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court’s dismissal of claims that Applicant brought against Respondent, the State Bank of India, which is a “foreign state” under 28 U.S.C. § 1603 and is thus presumptively immune from civil suit unless an exception to sovereign immunity is established under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (“FSIA”), 28 U.S.C. § 1605(a). 5. In affirming dismissal of the case, the Seventh Circuit held that, under the “direct-effect” prong of the FSIA’s commercial activity exception, id. § 1605(a)(2), a foreign state can be sued in a U.S. court only if the foreign state performed some “legally significant act” in the United States. Bhattacharya, 70 F.4th at 945. Thus, according to the Seventh Circuit, “a plaintiff wishing to invoke the commercial activity exception by pointing to a direct effect in the United States must be able to identify language in the agreement that designates the United States as a site for performance on the contract.” Id. at 944. 6. There are multiple, significant reasons to review the Seventh Circuit’s decision. First, the decision below implicates a circuit split regarding the criteria for satisfying the direct-effect test under § 1605(a)(2). Decisions of the Second, Seventh, and Ninth Circuits each apply a different version of the “legally significant act” test. E.g. id. at 945 (requiring some act “in the United States” to be legally significant); Guirlando v. T.C. Ziraat Bankasi A.S., 602 F.3d 69, 77 (2d Cir. 2010) (requiring “defendant’s conduct that is alleged to have had a direct effect in the United States” to be legally significant); Terenkian v. Republic of Iraq, 694 F.3d 1122, 1135 (9th Cir. 2012) (requiring “the effect [in the United States] of the act” outside the United States to be legally significant). By contrast other circuits have either expressly rejected or do not directly require a “legally significant act.” E.g., Voest-Alpine Trading USA Corp