Lucknow, Jul : Already facing a probe by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case, more trouble is in store for gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari as Barabanki police charge-sheeted him along with half a dozen of his cohorts in connection with the case of allegedly using fake documents to register an ambulance that was used to ferry the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) MLA from a jail to a court in Mohali in Punjab.

Ansari is currently lodged at Banda district jail after he was transferred from the Punjab jail on the Supreme Court’s order. “The charge sheet has been filed against Mukhtar Ansari and five others at a local court. All the accused are in jail,” Superintendent of Police (Barabanki) Yamuna Prasad told reporters Today.

Besides Ansari, others charge-sheeted in the case are Mau-based doctor Alka Rai, Dr. Sheshnath Rai, Mohammad Syed Mujahid, Anand Yadav, and Saleem.

The charge sheet has been filed under IPC sections 419 (cheating by personation), 420 (forgery), 471 (fraudulently or dishonestly using documents as genuine), 467 (forgery of valuable security), and 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating) apart from Section 7 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act. Police said that they are conducting raids to trace three absconding accused – Shahid, Surendra Sharma, and Afroz and non-bailable warrants have been obtained against them.

In March this year, UP Police began an inquiry into the ambulance after it came to light that the vehicle used to ferry Ansari to a Mohali court from Ropar jail in Punjab was carrying the registration number of Barabanki. In the preliminary probe, police found that documents such as voter ID cards and PAN cards submitted for the registration of the ambulance were fake. A case was lodged at the Kotwali police station in Barabanki against Ansari and his associates on April 2.

During the investigation, police found that forged documents of Dr. Alka Rai of Shyam Sanjeevani Hospital and Research Center in Mau were used for registering the vehicle. Also, Ansari’s associates — Rajnath Yadav and Mujahid — had gone to Alka Rai to get her signatures on fake documents, police had said.

After the above findings, the Barabanki police went ahead with their arrests and other accused. In the meantime, a team also left for Punjab and seized the controversial ambulance, and brought it here for further investigation. Last week, the sleuths of the Special Task Force (STF) arrested Salim the driver of the ambulance which was used to ferry gangster-turned-politician. He was a resident of Ghazipur and arrested from Lucknow along with Mujahid, who is from the Mau district. (UNI)