Lucknow, March 29 -- The Chief Judicial Magistrate's court in Banda initiated a judicial inquiry into the demise of gangster-politician Mukhtar Ansari as his family members alleged that he was poisoned inside the Banda jail.
Banda's Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM), Bhagwan Das Gupta, has appointed Garima Singh, Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (MP-MLA Court Banda), to lead the investigation, seeking a comprehensive probe report within a month.
Ansari, aged 63, was transferred from the district jail to Rani Durgavati Medical College in Banda on Thursday evening in an unconscious state and subsequently passed away at the hospital due to a cardiac arrest.
A panel of doctors conducted a post-mortem at Rani Durgavati Medical College in Banda, amid a security alert across several districts in Uttar Pradesh.
Allegations of foul play surfaced when Afzal Ansari, Mukhtar's brother and Ghazipur MP, claimed that his brother had been subjected to slow poisoning while in custody.
"Mukhtar said that he was given a poisonous substance in food in jail. This happened for the second time. Around 40 days ago also he was given poison. And recently, he was again given this (poison) due to which his condition is bad," Afzal Ansari stated.
Mukhtar Ansari's son Umar also alleged that his father was given poison in the food and said he would approach the court. "We said this before also and even today we will say the same thing. On March 19, he was poisoned at dinner. We will move to the judiciary, we have full faith in it...," he said.
He also wrote to the Banda district magistrate, alleging that his father was killed in a planned manner and demanding that the postmortem be performed at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi.
"We have no faith of getting justice from the administration and the doctors' team of Banda," his letter said.
In a petition filed by Mukhtar's advocate in the High Court and the Supreme Court, it is alleged that he was poisoned twice during lunch in Banda jail, suggesting a concerted effort by the government administration to eliminate him.
Expressing concerns over the disregard for legal procedures during Mukhtar's incarceration, his advocate Saubhagya Mishra lamented: "Law was not followed when Mukhtar was in jail. His son Umar and other family members were not even allowed to meet or talk to him." The advocate further highlighted the perceived threat to Mukhtar's life and the lack of adequate safety measures.
Meanwhile, Several politicians including RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav, AIMIM Chief Asaduddin Owaisi and Bahujan Samaj Party Chief Mayawati have called for a CBI probe into the dreaded gangster's family's allegations. The BJP slammed them saying they have the habit of emotionally exploiting every issue to spoil communal harmony.
The demise of Mukhtar Ansari has raised concerns about the law-and-order situation in Uttar Pradesh. Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav has demanded a probe supervised by a Supreme Court judge into such suspicious cases.
In a statement posted in Hindi on X, Yadav stressed the government's responsibility to safeguard individuals' lives in all circumstances and locations. He emphasized the need for thorough investigations into cases involving deaths in police custody, jail altercations, medical emergencies, hospital treatments, alleged encounters, false suicides, or accidents, to maintain public trust in the judicial process.
Mayawati, whose BSP fielded him in Lok Sabha polls twice, said on X, "The persistent apprehension and serious allegations made by Mukhtar Ansari's family regarding his death in jail require a high-level investigation so that true facts of his death are be revealed."
Rashtriya Janata Dal leader and former Bihar deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav said Constitutional institutions should take suo motu cognizance of such incidents.
Ansari had over 60 criminal cases pending against him. In 2005, he and his family were accused of murdering BJP MLA Krishnanand Rai.
Former Union minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi targeted Opposition parties over their remarks. Krishnanand Rai's wife Alka Rai described Ansari's death as "divine justice".
The suspicion escalated after Ansari's lawyer applied for a virtual hearing in a Barabanki court on March 21, asserting that Ansari had been administered "slow poison" in jail, deteriorating his health.
Earlier, Ansari had been hospitalised for approximately 14 hours on April 26 due to complaints of abdominal pain.
A long convoy of vehicles left the city in the evening with Ansari's body for his home district Ghazipur. It included 24 police vehicles, two others carrying family members and the ambulance with the body of the former legislator.
The burial at the family cemetery, where a grave was dug during the day for Ansari, was expected to take place Friday night or Saturday morning - depending on how late the body arrived.
Shops in Mohammadabad remained closed during the day and many people gathered outside the Ansari family home. Gulab Ram, a former Ghazipur unit chief of the Bahujan Samaj Party, said that "people are heartbroken".
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.