Mukhtar couldn’t be produced to give evidence against Brijesh in court

Varanasi: Jailed mafia don Mukhtar Ansari could not be produced before the court of additional district judge-1 (MP-MLA) Durgesh Pandey of Ghazipur physically by the Banda jail officials on Tuesday to give evidence against his arch rival and mafia don Brijesh Singh in the 2001 Usarichatti case of attack on his (Mukhtar) fleet. The jail officials cited unavailability of sufficient police force for their inability to produce Mukhtar in the court.
“However, Brijesh appeared before the court where no proceedings could take place,” said Mukhtar’s lawyer Liyaqat Ali, mentioning that the court fixed January 17 as the next date for hearing with an instruction to produce Mukhtar before it physically.
“As Banda jail officials had informed the court that due to unavailability of sufficient police force Mukhtar could not be sent to Ghazipur from Banda, the court directed the officials concerned to arrange proper security cover for producing Mukhtar on the next date of hearing,” he added.
Earlier, instead of producing Mukhtar physically before the court on January 3 as per its directive, the Banda jail authorities had tried to produce him through video conferencing to give evidence against Brijesh but the court had rejected the bid of the prisons department officials and asked to produce him physically on January 10.
On July 15, 2001, the car fleet of Mukhtar and his supporters was attacked. Three persons including the gunner of Mukhtar were killed in this attack while nine had suffered injuries. Following the incident Mukhtar had lodged a named FIR against Brijesh, his close aide Tribhuvan Singh and 15 others. After his release from Varanasi Central Jail, on August 16, 2022 Brijesh had reached Ghazipur to appear before the court for hearing in this case. On September 6, 2022 Brijesh had appeared before the court physically again while Mukhtar appeared through video conferencing from Banda jail.