The family of former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Krishnanand Rai, who was killed by Mukhtar Ansari, said the death of gangster-politician is a ‘blessing of Almighty’.
How do I put it? The Almighty's blessing is this. Justice has been served today, and I used to pray to him for it. After the occurrence (the murder), we never celebrated Holi; hence, Alka Rai told ANI, "I felt that today is Holi for us."
Piyush Rai, the son of Krishnanand Rai, said, "My mother and I have received the blessings of Baba Vishwanath and Baba Gorakhnath."
An MP MLA court found Mukhtar Ansari guilty of killing BJP MLA Krishnanand Rai in April 2023 and sentenced him to 10 years in jail.
On November 29, 2005, Krishnanand Rai was returning home following the opening of a cricket competition in the Siyadi region. The BJP leader's cavalcade was ambushed at a small bridge in the Ghazipur hamlet of Ussarchati at around 1:30 pm. The location is part of Bhawarkol.
Six attackers with AK-47 assault rifles surrounded two cars carrying Krishnanand Rai and his six aides and showered them with gunshots, a police official who wished to remain anonymous informed HT. There were at least 400 gunshot shells collected at the location, with 21 of them discovered inside Rai's body alone.
Ansari and his brother Afzal Ansari, who had been defeated by Rai in the assembly election for the Mohammadabad seat, were identified as the principal conspirators in the FIR.
Rai and the Ansari brothers have been opponents since the Mohammadabad assembly contest in 2002, according to the CBI. It was Afzal Ansari's first victory since 1982.
The Ansari brothers' close aide Prem Prakash Singh, better known as Munna Bajrangi, was also allegedly implicated in the murder. On July 9, 2018, Bajrangi was shot and killed inside the Baghpat district jail by another criminal, Sunil Rathi.
Mau-born Mukhtar Ansari was also said to wield considerable sway over the nearby districts of Ghazipur and Varanasi.
