In the 2006 Umesh Pal kidnapping case, the Uttar Pradesh court found gangster-politician Atiq Ahmad and two other defendants guilty on Tuesday and sentenced them to imprisonment for life. Ahmad, Saulat Hanif, a lawyer, and Dinesh Pasi were found guilty in the case by Special MP-MLA court judge Dinesh Chandra Shukla, according to government attorney Gulab Chandra Agrahari. According to Indian Criminal Code Section 364-A (kidnapping or abduction for the purpose of murder), all three were found guilty, he added. The death sentence is the maximum penalty allowed by this provision.Khalid Azim alias Ashraf, Ahmads brother, and six other defendants have been acquitted in the Umesh Pal kidnapping case. Umesh Pal said that on February 28, 2006, he was abducted at gunpoint after refusing to retract and give in to Ahmads pressure. On July 5, 2007, a FIR was filed in the matter against Ahmed, his brother, and others. In this case, the police had filed a chargesheet against 11 defendants. Afterwards, one of them passed away. Additionally, Ahmad and Ashraf are charged with conspiring to murder Umesh Pal while they were both in prison. On February 24 of last year, Umesh Pal was shot and killed outside of his home in Prayagraj.Prior to the hearing in the case, Ahmad, Ashraf, and others were transported from Naini jail to the court in separate police vans and produced there under heavy security. They were both taken on Monday following lengthy vehicle trips from two different institutions to the Naini Central Prison. After a long 24-hour road trip from Gujarat, Atiq Ahmed was brought by the Uttar Pradesh police from the Sabarmati Prison in Ahmedabad to the Naini Jail in Prayagraj on Monday.Jaya Pal, Umesh Pals wife, had stated that although she wont be attending court, she will “hope” that Ahmad be given the death penalty. “I wont be appearing in court. I will be at home and will pray for Ahmad to receive the death penalty. If they are given a life sentence.In Prayagraj, a case was filed against Ahmad, his brother, his wife Shaista Parveen, two sons, assistants Guddu Muslim and Ghulam, and nine other people after Umesh Pals wife made a complaint.Atiq Ahmad, a former Samajwadi Party member from Phulpur, was moved to the Sabarmati Central Jail in Gujarat in June 2019 as a result of a Supreme Court order. Atiq Ahmad had been imprisoned in Uttar Pradesh when he was accused of plotting the kidnapping and assault of real estate developer Mohit Jaiswal. He is mentioned in more than 100 criminal cases, including the murder of Umesh Pal, according to the authorities.Before killing Umesh Pal, in 2016, an attempt was made to thrown Umesh Pal from the fourth floor of the court premises to make him withdraw the case. For which the FIR was been registered in the case at the Colonelganj police station.Notably, Umesh Pal filed an application in the high court asking for the early settlement in the case, on which Allahabad court has ordered to complete the hearing in the case by March 16, 2023. However, Umesh Pal was murdered after returning from defending the case on February 24, this year.Jaya Devis testimonyJaya Devi, the widow of Umesh Pal said that “We want justice and I request CM Yogi to help us. We want to hear death sentence for Atiq Ahmed for killing my husband. If he and his brother will survive it will be a problem for us and society.”Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath statement in assemblyChief Minister Yogi Adityanath during the state assembly last month, lashed out at Samajwadi Party for supporting the mafias like Atiq Ahmed, after the killing of then BSP MLA Raju Pal on January 25, 2005, Umesh Pal, then a zila panchayat member, who was a witness to the murder.
