“At around 8.25 pm today (Tuesday), the convicted/undertrial prisoner, Mukhtar Ansari, aged 63 years, was brought to the emergency department of the Rani Durgawati Medical College, Banda,” the hospital said in a statement issued Thursday night.
“A team of nine doctors provided the patient with an immediate treatment facility. But despite vigorous efforts, the patient died due to cardiac arrest,” the hospital said.
After hearing the news, Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav Friday wrote on X, “In all such cases, there should be a probe under the supervision of a justice of the Supreme Court… The government that cannot secure life has no right to stay… This is the zero hour for law and order in UP.”
हर हाल में और हर स्थान पर किसी के जीवन की रक्षा करना सरकार का सबसे पहला दायित्व और कर्तव्य होता है। सरकारों पर निम्नलिखित हालातों में से किसी भी हालात में, किसी बंधक या क़ैदी की मृत्यु होना, न्यायिक प्रक्रिया से लोगों का विश्वास उठा देगा:
– थाने में बंद रहने के दौरान
– जेल के…— Akhilesh Yadav (@yadavakhilesh) March 29, 2024
Bahujan Samajwadi Party (BSP) chief Mayawati also referred to “doubts and serious allegations levelled by the family of Mukhtar Ansari” in an X post, demanding a high-level probe into the cause of death.
मुख़्तार अंसारी की जेल में हुई मौत को लेकर उनके परिवार द्वारा जो लगातार आशंकायें व गंभीर आरोप लगाए गए हैं उनकी उच्च-स्तरीय जाँच जरूरी, ताकि उनकी मौत के सही तथ्य सामने आ सकें। ऐसे में उनके परिवार का दुःखी होना स्वाभाविक। कुदरत उन्हें इस दुःख को सहन करने की शक्ति दे।
— Mayawati (@Mayawati) March 29, 2024
However, the media cell of the Directorate General (prisons) Thursday said Ansari had a fall in the toilet in his barrack. The media cell also said the doctors in jail treated Ansari first, and a separate doctors’ team later referred him to the Banda medical college.
Ansari’s lawyer Randhir Singh Suman has approached the Barabanki court, demanding an FIR against the Banda jail administration. Suman’s application asked the court to consider Ansari’s letter his death statement. The court, which had been hearing a UP-Gangster Act case against Ansari, Friday sought a report on the death in the next hearing.
The Banda district magistrate (DM) has initiated a magisterial probe into the death under the rules of the 2022 UP jail manual and appointed Rajesh Kumar, additional DM (finance/revenue), as the investigating officer. Such an inquiry is usually conducted in all custodial deaths.
The Chief Judicial Magistrate court, Banda, has also initiated a judicial probe into the death at the behest of the UP government and appointed an additional judge of the court as the inquiry officer. Such inquiries are also usual in cases of custodial deaths.
Mukhtar Ansari, the elder brother of Member of Parliament (MP) Afzal Ansari, served as the MLA of Mau constituency in Uttar Pradesh (UP) five times between 1996 and 2022. He had been accused in 65 criminal cases and convicted in eight till he died. The murder of a BJP MLA and a fake arms license case were among the prominent cases in which he was convicted. In 2021, Ansari was brought from Punjab’s Ropar jail to UP’s Banda jail, where he remained till the end.
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What was the 2001 Usri Chatti case
Mukhtar Ansari’s elder brother Afzal, a BSP MP from Ghazipur, is now set to fight the Lok Sabha election on an SP ticket. After Ansari was brought to the medical college, Afzal told media persons Tuesday, “The day of a person’s death is fixed, but the devil can make attempts nonetheless. Several attempts are being made to kill him. It is a conspiracy to ensure that Mukhtar cannot testify in court in the Usri-Chatti case.”
The case is from July 2001, when gunmen attacked the convoy of Ansari, then Mau MLA, when it was passing through the Usri Chatti area on the Yusufpur-Kasimabad road. A gang war followed, killing Ansari’s bodyguard and a shooter from the attacker’s side. Another man, an accused, died of injuries later. Mafia don Brijesh Singh and his friend Tribhuvan Singh are among the accused in the case, which is in the last stages of hearing.
Brijesh Singh had won the 2017 Member of Legislative Council (MLC) poll from Varanasi-Chandauli-Bhadohi seat when the BJP paved the way for his win by not fielding any candidate against him.
“If Mukhtar testifies in the case, Brijesh Singh (mafia) and Tribhuvan Singh will be jailed,” Afzal said Tuesday.
Afzal had also alleged “a collusion” between the “government, criminals and bureaucrats” behind the attempts to kill Mukhtar. “We are trying to ensure his security through legal ways.”
According to Afzal, he had tried contacting UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to request him to shift Ansari to Medanta Hospital or any other bigger hospital, and that the family was ready to bear the treatment costs if the government would not.
Umar Ansari, Mukhtar’s younger son, told the media Tuesday, “The main thing is that everything is happening in front of you (the government)… you are giving (Mukhtar) food. When the protector turns devourer, what can we say; only God can save now.”
‘Mukhtar told Afzal about being poisoned twice’
Afzal had also said that he met Ansari Tuesday for a few minutes. “He told me that he had been given poison twice. He was poisoned nearly 40 days ago and then again on 19 March,” Afzal said Tuesday.
Afzal had said the family could only hope for a good outcome “if doctors work independently”.
He added: “A surgeon and two other doctors are treating him. The doctor is a surgeon, though the ailment does not require surgery. If the doctor works independently, we can hope for something; otherwise, everyone knows how people are under pressure.”
On Tuesday, police force, including Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) companies, had been deployed outside the medical college. After Ansari’s death Thursday, more police personnel joined in.
A late-night meeting Thursday at UP CM Yogi Adityanath’s residence on Lucknow’s 5 Kalidas Marg Tuesday saw the presence of UP Director General of Police Prashant Kumar and Additional Director General of Police (law and order) Amitabh Yash, claimed government sources. Adityanath, the sources added, directed the top officers to ensure that no untoward incident break out in the state.
Police sources Thursday said a panel of five doctors would conduct a post-mortem on Ansari; then a convoy of 26 vehicles will transport his body to his residence in Ghazipur.
Heavy police force remained deployed outside Ansari’s residence at “Phatak” Muhammadabad. Police officers reached the spot and asked the family to pacify the public gathered at the spot. As slogans of “Mukhtar Ansari Zindabad” were heard, Mukhtar’s MLA-nephew Suhaib Ansari asked the public to maintain calm.
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What Ansari wrote in his letter to Barabanki court
In a 21 March 2024 letter to the Barabanki MP/MLA court, Ansari alleged he was poisoned in jail 40 days ago. The court was hearing a UP-Gangster Act case against him.
The letter, a copy of which is with ThePrint, claimed that Ansari, the jail staffer who made his food, and the person who tasted the food before serving it fell sick that day and received treatment.
Ansari also wrote that due to the poison, he suffered pain in his hands and legs, which then turned cold. He felt he would die, he wrote.
“I am feeling trepidation. Before this, I was healthy,” he had written adding that he had received a death threat inside the Banda jail and any untoward incident could happen.
Demanding proper treatment, Ansari also demanded the constitution of a medical board for his treatment and directions to ensure his security.
After hearing the allegations, the UP government 24 March suspended three jail officials, a jailor and two deputy jailors of Banda jail.
SP & RJD raise questions about Mukhtar’s death
The SP as well as Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader Tejashwi Yadav raised questions about the death while offering his condolences to Mukhtar’s family.
“Pray to God to give peace to the departed soul and strength to the grieving family. Some days ago, they complained Mukhtar was given poison inside the jail, but it was not taken seriously… Constitutional bodies should take suo motu cognisance of such strange cases,” Yadav wrote on X.
Retired IPS officer Amitabh Thakur demanded an investigation by a judicial commission led by a sitting High Court judge into the allegations raised by Ansari and his family.
SP leader I.P. Singh has demanded the Supreme Court directed all state governments to beef up the security of politicians lodged in jails, or else any politician could suffer the same fate. Singh also demanded that jailed SP leader Azam Khan be shifted to a state not ruled by the BJP, expressing concern that the next conspiracy could be hatched against him. “Today, no citizen’s life is secure in this country,” he wrote on X.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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