Mukhtar Ansari brought to UP's Banda Jail from Punjab

BSP strongman Mukhtar Ansari has finally been brought from Punjab to Uttar Pradesh's Banda Jail after a long tug of war. Amid heavy security, the Uttar Pradesh police team reached Banda late in the night with Mukhtar Ansari.

Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh): Uttar Pradesh Police on Wednesday morning brought to Banda prison gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari, who had spent over two years in Punjab prison. Ansari has been kept in an enclosed barrel no 16 which has CCTV cameras installed within its premises to keep an eye on its day-to-day activities.

The fugitive hoodlum tested negative for the novel coronavirus, the test for which was done today morning. Later on, he will be shifted to barrel no 15 after a week.

The convoy bringing Mukhtar reached Banda around 4.30 a.m. and the ambulance carrying the don and three vehicles with senior police officials entered the jail premises. Vehicles belonging to media houses that had been tailing the convoy were stopped at a distance from the jail.

The high voltage drama in bringing Ansari from Ropar in Punjab to Banda in Uttar Pradesh finally ended with the safe shifting of the don to Uttar Pradesh.

Immediately after he was brought to Banda jail, a team of four doctors medically examined him and he was then shifted to the barrack.

Official sources said that the panel of four doctors has been asked to remain on call by the Banda jail.

"We were tasked to bring politician Mukhtar Ansari to Banda jail. He was brought here late in the night," said Satya Prakash Sharma, CO Sadar. He said that the vehicle followed the designated routes and Ansari, along with our constable were made to wear bullet-proof jackets.

Earlier, the convoy bringing the don from Punjab was briefly stopped on Tuesday evening at Jewar for refuelling and then again at Agra, for a change of drivers.

In the wake of Mukhtar Ansari being brought to Banda Jail, a high-level meeting under the leadership of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath was held at the CM residence in Lucknow on Tuesday night.

In the meeting, the Chief Minister directed that Mukhtar Ansari should not be provided with any additional facility inside Banda Jail, adding that he should be treated in the jail like a common prisoner. A high alert was also declared in many districts of UP.

The BSP MLA Mukhtar Ansari had been lodged in Ropar Jail of Punjab since 2019. It is following Supreme Court orders, that he was shifted to Banda Jail.

According to the UP police, Ansari faces 52 cases in the state and elsewhere, and 15 of them are at the trial stage.

The police have, till now, arrested 96 criminals and seized, freed, or demolished property worth Rs 192 crore linked to the BSP MLA and his associates.

The transfer of Mukhtar Ansari had taken a political turn last month when the Yogi Adityanath government told the Supreme Court that the Punjab government was "shamelessly protecting" the legislator by not handing over his custody to face trial "in 10 heinous cases of murder, extortion, cheating, fraud" and "gangster acts" in the special court for MPs and MLAs in Allahabad.

UP BJP MLA Alka Rai, wife of former legislator Krishnanand Rai who was murdered in 2005, had also been sending letters to Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, accusing the Congress government in Punjab of helping Ansari, an accused in the murder of her husband in evading court appearances in UP.

With IANS inputs