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Bareilly’s prison guard & canteen supplier held for ‘helping Atiq Ahmad’s jailed brother hold secret meetings’
On Tuesday, police arrested jail canteen supplier Daya Ram (alias Nanhe) and jail guard Shiv Hari Awasthi for allegedly helping Ashraf, who is lodged in the Bareilly jail for the past few years, hold secret meetings and providing him with outside items.
LUCKNOW In a rerun of the Abbas Ansari case in which it was revealed that the Mau MLA was helped by Chitrakoot jail authorities in meeting his wife illegally, the Bareilly police unit has now exposed a similar nexus between mafioso-turned-criminal Atiq Ahmad’s younger brother Khalid Azeem (alias Ashraf) and officials of the district jail.
On Tuesday, police arrested jail canteen supplier Daya Ram (alias Nanhe) and jail guard Shiv Hari Awasthi for allegedly helping Ashraf, who is lodged in the Bareilly jail for the past few years, hold secret meetings and providing him with outside items.
Sharing further details, SSP Bareilly Akhilesh Chaurasiya said, “Ashraf’s brother-in-law Saddam used to meet him in the jail with help from prison guard Shiv Hari Awasthi. Meanwhile, jail canteen supplier Daya Ram used to allegedly provide money and other material to Ashraf secretly. Based on a complaint in the matter by new jail police outpost in-charge Anil Kumar, an FIR has been lodged against Ashraf, Saddam, his local aide Lalla Gaddi, Awasthi and Daya Ram as well as other unidentified persons.”
The SSP added, ”Daya Ram, who supplies vegetables to the jail, used to take other outside items to Ashraf while Shiv Hari Awasthi facilitated Ashraf’s meeting with his aides through Saddam without mentioning their visits in jail records. He said Awasthi used to put one ID for the entry of six-seven people at a time. This would happen at least thrice in a week. An SIT headed by a CO rank officer has been formed to investigate the matter thoroughly and efforts are being made to arrest Saddam.”
Earlier, a similar nexus of local authorities of Chitrakoot jail, jail canteen supplier with criminals was exposed after arrest jailed MLA Abbas Ansari’s wife Nikhat Bano and her driver Niyaz Ansari from inside the jail campus on February 12. Abbas is an accused in a money laundering case. After the case surfaced, as many as three jail officials -- including a woman deputy jail -- were arrested along with Nikhat and Niyaz.
A Bareilly police official said similar to Chitrakoot case, Ashraf’s brother-in-law Saddam had taken a house on rent in Bareilly and he used to arrange Ashraf’s meeting with builders, contractors and others people in white collar jobs. He also said that a separate case has been lodged against Saddam based on the complaint from one Mohd Haseen for taking his brother’s house on rent using fake identity proof.
The U.P. Police has started tightening noose around aides and people associated with Atiq Ahmad and his brother Ashraf after a half-a-dozen assailants shot multiple rounds at the lawyer and the prime witness in the BSP MLA Raju Pal murder case, Umesh Pal, at his residence in Sulem Sarai area, under Dhumanganj police station limits on February 24. In the shootout, Umesh Pal as well as the two police gunners -- Sandeep Nishad and Raghvendra Singh -- deployed in his security were also critically injured and succumbed to their injuries during the treatment.
The incident has triggered panic in Prayagraj and other parts of the state as Umesh Pal was attacked in full public view. As many as five people opened indiscriminate firing and hurled crude bombs to create panic and keep onlookers away from them. Moreover, the crude bombs caused heavy smoke which aided the assailants to flee. Other than being prime witness in BSP MLA Raju Pal murder case, Umesh Pal had also lodged five other cases against Atiq Ahmad, Ashraf and his henchmen allegedly for abducting and threatened not to give a statement in the case.
BSP MLA Raju Pal was shot dead in broad daylight in Prayagraj on January 25, 2005, and Atiq is one of the accused in this sensational murder case. A CBI inquiry was ordered by the Supreme Court in 2016 in this case. Raju Pal was murdered barely three months after he won the (then) Allahabad (West) assembly seat in his electoral debut by defeating Atiq’s younger brother Ashraf.
