Uttar Pradesh, India: Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) Member of Parliament (MP) Afzal Ansari is set to lose his Lok Sabha membership after Ghazipur MP/MLA Court sentenced him to four years imprisonment in a kidnapping and murder case, alongside his brother and former MLA Mukhtar Ansari on April 29. Furthermore, the Court sentenced Mukhtar Ansari to 10 years imprisonment and imposed a Rs 5 lakh fine.
Afzal Ansari is set to lose his Lok Sabha membership u/s 8(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, as he has been sentenced to more than two years imprisonment. Afzal Ansari appeared before the Court in person, whereas his brother appeared for sentencing through video conferencing. Security has been increased in Ghazipur in view of the verdict in the case against the Ansari brothers.
The case against the BSP MP was registered under the Gangster Act after he was booked for his involvement in the murder of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Krishnanand Rai in 2005. Krishnanand Rai was an MLA from Muhammadabad and was close to Manoj Sinha, who was a minister for five years in a Union Government from 2014-2019. Afzal Ansari defeated Manoj Sinha to become the MP of Ghazipur.
The killing of Krishnanand Rai in November 2005 was one of the most sensational political murders in history. Krishnanand Rai was killed along with six of his other companions in the mayhem. Unfazed by the regime, the killers fired a total of 400 bullets. After the post-mortem, 67 bullets were discovered and extracted from the bodies of the deceased.
It is pertinent to note that u/s 8(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, “a person convicted of any offence and sentenced to imprisonment for no less than two years shall be disqualified from the date of such conviction and shall continue to be disqualified for a period of six years since his release.”
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