Jailed gangster Mukhtar Ansari dies after being admitted to hospital

Jailed gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari passed away on Thursday night.

Ansari was admitted to Banda Medical College earlier today after he was found lying unconscious in his barrack. The jail officials immediately spotted him and took him to the district hospital, said a TOI report.

Sources in Banda jail said that Mukhtar Ansari suffered a heart attack and was taken to the hospital.

On Tuesday morning Mukhtar was found unconscious and was referred to the district hospital. He had complained of pain in the abdomen and constipation. He was discharged after treatment in 15 hours.

Last week after Mukhtar’s lawyer Randheer Singh Suman had moved an application before a court in Barabanki seeking proper medical examination alleging that ‘slow poisoning’ was being administered to him by Banda prison staff where he was presently lodged. Ansari has faced convictions in eight cases within a mere 18-month span.

Ansari was sentenced to life imprisonment on March 13 in a case related to obtaining an arms license with forged documents back in 1990. This was the eighth time in the past two years that courts in Uttar Pradesh had found the former MLA guilty and handed down a sentence.

Moreover, in December 2023, Ansari was convicted by the MP/MLA Court in Varanasi for intimidating Mahavir Prasad Rungta, a crucial witness in the murder case of 26-year-old coal merchant Nand Kishor Rungta. As a result, Ansari received a sentence of five and a half years of rigorous imprisonment along with a fine of Rs 10,000.

Adding to his legal woes, on October 15 of the preceding year, the Enforcement Directorate took action against Ansari as part of a money laundering investigation. The agency attached assets, including land, a building, and bank deposits, amounting to over Rs 73.43 lakh.

Ansari had been elected as an MLA from the Mau constituency five times, including twice as a BSP candidate. He last contested the assembly polls in 2017.

(With TOI inputs)