After a Prayagraj court found them guilty in the 2006 Umesh Pal kidnapping case, gangster Atiq Ahmed and two others were sentenced to life in prison.
In the case, seven others, including Atiq Ahmed’s brother Khalid Azim alias Ashraf, were acquitted.
Atiq Ahmed, a former MP and MLA facing at least 100 criminal charges, including murder and kidnapping, was brought from a Gujarat prison to Prayagraj by Uttar Pradesh police on Monday after a 24-hour road journey.Â
Today, footage from outside the court showed a long police cavalcade transporting the gangster-turned-politician in large vans as crowds gathered on both sides of the road.
Ahmed’s conviction comes just one month after the shocking murder of Umesh Pal, a key witness in the 2005 murder of Bahujan Samaj Party MLA Raju Pal.
On February 24, this year, Umesh Pal was shot dead as he exited the backseat of a Hyundai Creta SUV in Prayagraj. Two of his police bodyguards were also killed in the shootout.
Umesh Pal and one of his two police bodyguards were getting out of the SUV when multiple shooters appeared from behind him and began the fire. During the assault, another man was seen using crude bombs, which exploded in a cloud of smoke, causing panic and chaos on the road and people fleeing to safety. Many people got out of their cars and ran toward stores.
According to the UP police, Atiq Ahmed killed Umesh Pal after the latter named him as a key suspect in the 2005 murder. Umesh Pal claimed in 2006 that he was kidnapped at gunpoint after refusing to retract his statement to the police.
The court verdict in the 2006 kidnapping case was issued today in Prayagraj.
Following tough questions about the public killing of Umesh Pal, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath lashed out at opposition leader Akhilesh Yadav in the state assembly a day after the February shootout in Prayagraj, even mentioning his feud with his father.
“Isn’t it true that Atiq Ahmed, who has been charged by the victim’s family, is a member of the mafia fostered by the Samajwadi Party, and we have only worked to break its back?” Yogi Adityanath said, pointing a finger at Mr Yadav.
“Speaker, sir, he is the patron saint of all professional criminals and mafia.” They have crime running through their veins… “And I am telling this house today that we will run this mafia to the ground,” the Chief Minister had said, wagging his finger at Mr Yadav once more.
