Varanasi: Continuing its crackdown on the Mukhtar Ansari gang, the Ghazipur police on Tuesday lodged a third FIR in a week against gangster-turned-politician late Mukhtar Ansari’s elder brother and SP’s Ghazipur MP, Afzal Ansari, over alleged irregularities in records related to the sale and purchase of a firearm on his arms licence. This is the fifth FIR registered against members of the Mukhtar gang and the third against Afzal within a week.Ghazipur SP Iraj Raja said a third FIR was registered against Afzal after it came to light that the original file and purchase-sale records related to his arms licence were found missing from the record room.During the investigation, it surfaced that decades ago an NPB rifle was bought and sold in Along, Arunachal Pradesh, on Afzal’s licence. However, the file related to the transaction and the current status of the weapon are not clear. Police alleged that the records were made to disappear in collusion with the concerned arms clerks.Based on the findings, a case was registered against Afzal, arms clerk Gaurishankar Lal and another arms clerk, Sugriv Tiwari, at Kotwali police station in Ghazipur under charges of cheating, forgery, criminal conspiracy and relevant sections of the Arms Act, Raja said.He added that since July 22, this is the third FIR against Afzal, while a total of five FIRs have been lodged against members of the Mukhtar gang. Further investigation into the remaining arms licences is continuing.On the orders of the DIG, Varanasi Range, physical verification is being carried out of 51 arms licences issued to people linked to the IS-191 gang, including Mukhtar and his family members, and 145 weapons bought and sold on those licences. For this, separate teams of circle officers and station house officers have been formed under the leadership of the ASP (City) and ASP (Rural).
