Uttar Pradesh Crackdown On Mafia: I-T Department Seizes Assets Of Mukhtar Ansari And Aide, 23 Benami Properties On The Radar

Income Tax Department on Thursday (12 May) attached properties worth Rs 2 crore belonging to gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari and his aide Ganesh Mishra.

The Times of India reported that as many as 23 benami properties that belong to the gangster have been identified under the Prohibition of Benami Properties Prevention Act (PBPPA) and will also be investigated soon.

So far, properties worth Rs 290 crore have been seized from his accomplices from across the state, while immovable property worth Rs 282 crore has been freed from the gang’s illegal possession.

A team of Lucknow Income Tax Department’s PBPPA wing came to Ghazipur on Thursday to investigate properties belonging to one Ganesh Dutt Mishra, believed to be a close aide of Ansari.

The police said that Mishra was a ‘benamidar’ in the said property which actually belonged to Mukhtar Ansari. Mishra, a close confidante of Ansari and his neighbour in Ghazipur, was found to be handling all of Ansari's real estate ventures.

"Most of these properties purchased as benami are suspected to be proceeds of crime and corruption by Ansari. The process for attachment for all the properties and many other properties has been started," said a senior official.

As per an India Today report, the Income Tax Department also discovered that in 2014, a company owned by Ansari's father-in-law, Aagaz Project and Construction Ltd, took a loan of Rs 1.60 crore from a nationalised bank with a property belonging to Ganesh Dutt Mishra as security for the loan.

The company has Ansari's wife and son as directors, proving Mishra's direct link to Ansari and that he was working for him as a benamidar.

Mukhtar Ansari is currently in Uttar Pradesh’s Banda jail serving a sentence under the Gangster Act for 10 years. He has close to 60 criminal cases registered against him.