India
oi-Madhuri Adnal
Gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmed was on Tuesday sentenced to life imprisonment in the 2006 kidnapping case of lawyer Umesh Pal.
Ahmad and two others including Dinesh Pasi and Khan Saulat Haneef were sentenced to life imprisonment and ordered to pay Rs 1 lakh compensation to Umesh Pal’s family and Rs 3000 as fine on each imposed.
Special MP-MLA court judge Dinesh Chandr Shukla held Ahmed, Saulat Hanif, a lawyer, and Dinesh Pasi guilty in the case, government counsel Gulab Chandra Agrahari said. Seven others including Ahmed’s brother Khalid Azim alias Ashraf have been acquitted in the case, he said.
After the killing of the then BSP MLA Raju Pal on January 25, 2005, Umesh Pal, then a zila panchayat member, had told police he was a witness to the murder.
Umesh Pal had alleged that when he refused to retract and buckle under pressure from Ahmed, he was kidnapped at gunpoint on February 28, 2006. The FIR was registered on July 5, 2007, against Ahmed, his brother and others.
The police had submitted a chargesheet in the matter against 11 people. One of them later died.
Ahmed and Ashraf are also accused of being involved in a conspiracy, while they were both in prison, to kill Umesh Pal. Umesh Pal was gunned down outside his Prayagraj residence on February 24.
एमपी-एमएलए कोर्ट के बाहर #AtiqAhmed के खिलाफ वकीलों ने की जमकर नारेबाजी, फांसी दो फांसी दो के लगे नारे #Prayagraj @Manchh_Official
Lawyers raised slogans against #AtiqAhmed outside the MP-MLA court, hang him, hang him pic.twitter.com/YZuPxLzABe— PUNIT TIWARI (@punittiwari27) March 28, 2023
Earlier, the Supreme Court rejected Atiq Ahmed’s request for protection during his UP police custody.The Supreme Court bench, however, allowed Atiq Ahmed to approach the Allahabad High court for protection after claiming a threat to his life in UP Police’s custody.
अतीक #अतीक़अहमद की एक नई यात्रा,
उमेश पाल केस में दोषी करार होने के बाद
अब तो जिंदगी जेल में कटेगी !
जैसी करनी वैसी भरनी.#AtiqAhmed #UmeshPalCase #Prayagraj #AtiqueAhmed #BusAccident #Newsnight #TeJran #StockMarket #bachelor #WWERaw #अतीक़अहमद #sunilshah pic.twitter.com/SDPwvKv8ST— Sunil kumar Shah (@SunilShah4444) March 28, 2023
On Monday, the two brothers were brought to the Naini jail, after long road journeys from two separate prisons amid allegations that the former Samjwadi Party legislator would be killed in an encounter on the way. Security has been tightened in the court premises as well as the jail complex where the accused are lodged.
The police cavalcade which brought Atiq Ahmed from the Sabarmati Jail in Ahmedabad around 5.30 pm was followed by cars carrying TV crews, his sister Ayesha Noori and lawyers.
For Ahmed, the 1,200 km from the Gujarat jail took about 24 hours. Ashraf was brought from the Bareilly Central Jail, and his convoy reached an hour-and-a-half after Ahmed entered the jail.
The brothers are also accused of being involved in a conspiracy, while they were both in prison, to kill Umesh Pal, a witness in the Raju Pal murder in 2005.
Police vehicle carrying Atiq Ahmed almost turns turtle, hits cow
Umesh Pal’s wife Jaya Pal said she won’t be going to the court but will ”pray” that Ahmed gets capital punishment. ”I am not going to the court. I will be in my house and pray for capital punishment for Ahmed. If they get life imprisonment, they will continue to do the same things that they did with my husband,” Jaya Pal told reporters.
On February 23, the witness and two policemen assigned to protect Umesh Pal were gunned down in Prayagraj.
The Prayagraj police cavalcade, escorting Ahmed, started off from the Gujarat prison at about 6 pm Sunday in the road journey through parts of Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and finally Uttar Pradesh.
Huge police force was deployed at the main entrance of the Naini central jail, and entry of outsiders was stopped. A senior official of the Naini central jail said that Atiq Ahmed and his brother Ashraf will be kept separately in high-security barracks.
They have been brought to Prayagraj in compliance with the court’s orders, Police Commissioner Ramit Sharma said.
Cases registered
After the killing of BSP MLA Raju Pal on January 25, 2005, Umesh Pal, then a zila panchayat member, had told police he was a witness to the murder.
Umesh alleged that when he refused to retract and buckle under pressure from Atiq Ahmed, he was kidnapped at gunpoint on February 28, 2006. The FIR was registered on July 5, 2007 against Atiq, his brother Ashraf and four unidentified persons. The chargesheet mentioned 11 accused persons.
Atiq Ahmed, a former Samajwadi Party MP from Phulpur, was shifted to the Sabarmati Central Jail in Gujarat in June 2019 following a Supreme Court order after he was accused of orchestrating the kidnapping and assault of real estate businessman Mohit Jaiswal while in prison in Uttar Pradesh. He is named in more than 100 criminal cases, including the Umesh Pal murder case, police said.
Ashraf, lodged in the Bareilly District Jail since July 2020, was brought to the Naini Central Jail on Monday evening amid tight security arrangements, officials said. A police team accompanying him left Bareilly for Prayagraj on Monday morning.
Ahmed was allegedly involved in the killing of Raju Pal, who was shot dead in 2005. Umesh Pal, a key witness in the former BSP MLA’s murder case, was gunned down outside his Prayagraj residence on February 24.
On a complaint from Umesh Pal’s wife Jaya, a case was lodged at the Dhoomanganj police station in Prayagraj against Ahmed, his brother Ashraf, wife Shaista Parveen, two sons, aides Guddu Muslim and Ghulam, and nine others.
Jaya Pal alleged that her husband was the prime witness in the Raju Pal murder case. Ahmed and his aides allegedly abducted him in 2006 and forced him to give a statement in court in their favour. Umesh Pal had got a police complaint registered in this regard and the case was going on.
The FIR also alleged that a conspiracy was hatched by Ahmed, Ashraf and Parveen to kill Umesh Pal and his security guard Sandeep Nishad and the attack on them was carried out by the former MP’s sons and aides.
Two men allegedly linked to Umesh Pal’s killing – Arbaaz and Vijay Chowdhary alias Usman – were killed in police encounters on February 27 and March 6 respectively.
On March 13, the Uttar Pradesh Police had increased the reward for anyone providing information leading to the arrest of five accused, including former MP Atiq Ahmed’s son Asad, in the Umesh Pal murder case from Rs 2.5 lakh to Rs 5 lakh.