Mukhtar Ansari's aide Sanjeev Maheshwari alias Jeeva killed inside courtroom at Lucknow court

New Delhi, July 8

In a audacious attack, jailed gangster Mukhtar Ansari’s close aide, Sanjeev Maheshwari alias Jeeva was killed inside the Lucknow court premises by a man dressed as a lawyer. 

The police have identified the shooter as Vijay Yadav who has been arrested. Two Head Constables, Kamlesh and Lal Mohammad were injured in the shooting, have been admitted to a hospital whose conditions are stable. The firing left a minor girl injured and an 18-month-old child who was in the court with the mother. The mother and child also sustained injuries.

The police stated that Jeeva was brought from the Lucknow district jail to the Lucknow court to attend a court hearing in police security. At about 3.30 pm, when Maheshwari was about to enter the courtroom, the assailant who was dressed as a lawyer opened fire from behind killing him on the spot. As soon as the firing started, Maheshwari tried to run inside the courtroom, but fell on the ground.

The assailant was then nabbed by the lawyers present at the spot. He was beaten up before he was handed over to the police. 

The assailant, Vijay Yadav, who is undergoing treatment at a hospital, has two cases against him, including a case of kidnapping a minor. He was out on bail.

Maheshwari, a resident of Shamli, was in jail since 2003 when a CBI court sentenced him and former MLA Vijay Singh in the murder of senior BJP leader and MLA Brahm Dutt Dwivedi. Dwivedi was killed in Farrukhabad district in February 1997. In 2017, the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court upheld the trial court order.

The UP government has set up a three-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) under Additional Director General (Technical Services) Mohit Agarwal to probe the incident. Jt CP (Lucknow) Nilabja Choudhary and IGl (Ayodhya Range) Praveen Kumar are also members of this SIT. 

The SIT has also been asked to look into the security lapses inside the court premises and submit its report in a week. 

According to the police, Jeeva is a historysheeter involved in the murder of BJP MLA Krishnanand Rai in Ghazipur district in 2005, in which he was an accused along with Mukhtar Ansari and his brother Afzal Ansari. In 2019, a court acquitted all the accused in the case as all eyewitnesses and material witnesses turned hostile.

He was named in 24 cases out of which he was acquitted in 17. The cases, lodged in Muzaffarnagar, Shamli, Ghazipur, Farrukhabad, and Haridwar, include charges of murder, kidnapping, and extortion.

The police have seized his properties worth Rs 4 crore under the UP Gangsters Act.

Special DGP Prashant Kumar has directed all district police chiefs and police commissioners to look into the security of their respective district courts. They have also been directed to also check the security of prisoners brought to court and collect information from local intelligence.

The administration in Lucknow and Kanpur have also imposed Section 144 of the CrPc prohibiting group gatherings following the incident. 

UP CM Yogi Adityanath also visited the minor girl at the hospital and other injured persons to take stock of their health and treatment.