I-T Dept to confiscate Mukhtar Ansari's Rs 12-crore 'benami' asset in UP's Ghazipur

New Delhi: The Income Tax Department will soon confiscate a Rs 12-crore asset of deceased gangster-politician Mukhtar Ansari after the adjudicating authority constituted under the anti-benami assets law confirmed a 2023 attachment of the property, official sources said Wednesday.

The authority has held that the immovable property located at 'Mauja Kapurpur NZA under Sadar Tehsil' in Ghazipur district of Uttar Pradesh is a "benami" asset.

The investigation wing of the I-T Department in Lucknow issued a provisional order in April 2023 under the provisions of the Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Amendment Act of 2016 to attach this property.

The asset, a land parcel with an estimated market value of around Rs 12 crore, was impounded by the tax department in May.

According to the I-T Department's order, the "benamidar" (in whose name a benami property is standing) in this case was identified as Ansari's alleged associate and neighbour Ganesh Dutt Mishra. The "beneficial owner" was Ansari, it said.

Sources said the tax department will now initiate steps to confiscate this asset.

Benami means 'no name' or 'without name' and such properties are those in which the real beneficiary is not the one in whose name the property has been purchased.

Ansari died of a cardiac arrest at a hospital in Banda in March this year at the age of 63. A five-time MLA from the Mau Sadar seat, he was behind bars in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab since 2005. He had over 60 criminal cases pending against him.

He was sentenced in eight cases since September 2022 by different courts in Uttar Pradesh and was lodged in the Banda jail.

The adjudicating authority has held that Ansari, through his legal heirs Afsan Ansari, Umar Ansari and Abbas Ansari, is the "beneficial owner" of the asset.

It said the property shall not be transferred or otherwise dealt with, in any manner, except with its permission.

The adjudicating authority also directed the department to take "immediate steps" to attach the remaining part of this asset.