A Delhi court on Saturday remanded Uttar Pradesh's independent MLA Mukhtar Ansari to 14 days police custody in a MCOCA case for allegedly running an organized crime gang.
Ansari brought in New Delhi following a production warrant by local court in connection with the case registered under the stringent provisions of the law.
Additional Sessions Judge Madhu Jain remanded Ansari to custodial interrogation of Delhi Police to enable the investigators to unearth the whole conspiracy relating to running of an alleged organised gang in the national capital.
During the arguments, counsel for Ansari, I U Khan and S A Hashmi, contended there was no ground to invoke Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act against the sitting MLA as he has been in judicial custody in a different case in Uttar Pradesh since August 2005.
They submitted that he had never visited Delhi since then and there was no question of his being involved in any crime whatsoever in the national capital.
"Unless two criminal cases are pending against an accused, MCOCA cannot be invoked," they argued.
The counsels also claimed the Delhi Police has no territorial jurisdiction to slap charges against Ansari under MCOCA.
Special Public Prosecutor B S Kain sought 14 days custodial interrogation alleging Ansari was involved in running a crime syndicate along with inter-state gangster Munna Bajrangi and two other accused.
"My brother has been falsely implicated in the case at the instance of another UP-based gangster Brajesh Singh," Ansari's elder brother Afzal Ansari, a former MP, told reporters present outside the court.
Brijesh, who had remained elusive since 1989, was arrested in January 2008 from Orissa's Khurda district by a joint team of Orissa and Delhi Police.
Earlier, Uttar Pradesh prison authorities could not produce Ansari, an MLA from Mau who is in Ghazipur jail, in connection with the murder of BJP MLA Krishnanand Rai in 2005, before the court, citing his ill-health.
Delhi Police invoked MCOCA (Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act) against inter-state gangster Munna Bajrangi, arrested last year from Mumbai, and Ansari on the charge of running an organised crime syndicate here.
Ansari is wanted in a MCOCA case for being allegedly associated with Bajrangi in running the organised crime syndicate.
Bajrangi, whose real name is Prem Prakash Singh, was arrested from Mumbai by a joint team of the Delhi Police and Uttar Pradesh Police on October 29.
According to the police, Bajrangi is also allegedly involved in more than 10 murder cases across the country. PTI
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