New Delhi, Dec 13 (IANS): The Uttar Pradesh government on Wednesday objected to a plea filed in the Supreme Court seeking transfer of gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari to any jail outside UP in a "state ruled by any party other than the BJP".
Additional Solicitor General K.M. Natraj, appearing on behalf of the state government, urged a bench headed by Justice Hrishikesh Roy that the plea filed by Ansari's son Umar Ansari be dismissed in limine considering the political nature of prayer made in the petition filed under Article 32 of the Constitution.
"This matter should not be entertained at the threshold with this kind of prayer," he said.
At this, the bench, also comprising Justice Sandeep Mehta, asked senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who appeared on behalf of the petitioner, to amend the petition.
"Whenever you amend it, we will take it up.. There is a political angle, we will consider it appropriately," the bench said.
The matter will be taken up for further hearing on December 15.
In his plea filed before the apex court, Mukhtar Ansari’s son has alleged that there is a plan to assassinate his father in Banda Jail prior to the 2024 polls.
"As the petitioner’s father is from a political party that is in Opposition, politically and ideologically, to the ruling dispensation in the State, the petitioner, the petitioner’s father, brother and their family have been targets of persecution by the State," it stated.
The petition claimed that "state officials, rival politicians, and persons within the police establishment" have hatched a plan to murder the political figure, who has been a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), for five-consecutive terms from Uttar Pradesh’s Mau.