Gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari was convicted by a special MP-MLA court in Varanasi on Monday in the 1991 Awadhesh Rai murder case. He has been awarded life imprisonment in the case of murder of Congress leader Awadhesh Rai, brother of MLA Ajay Rai, on 3 August 1991.
Every time Mukhtar Ansari appears in the news, people mention that he is a relative of former vice president Hamid Ansari. It is often said Hamid Ansari is Mukhtar Ansari’s uncle, while some say they are cousins. While that is not true, it is also not completely untrue.
In fact, Mukhtar Ansari himself has claimed that he is related to Hamid Ansari. In February 2021, while opposing the UP government’s plea to shift him to the state from Punjab, he had said that he comes from an illustrious family with several well-known persons and freedom fighters. In this, he had also named Hamid Ansari.
Mukhtar Ansari said in an affidavit filed at the Supreme Court that he was a “part of a family that has made immense contribution to the Indian freedom movement and has given India many leaders in the form of Shri Muhammad Hamid Ansari who was the vice president of India, Shri Shaukatullah Ansari who served as the governor of Odisha, Justice Asif Ansari who was the judge of the Allahabad high court, and his own father Subhanullah Ansari who was a freedom fighter and social worker.”
It has been widely reported in media that Mukhtar Ansari comes from a distinguished family. His paternal grandfather Mukhtar Ahmed Ansari was the president of the Congress party. While his maternal grandfather Mohammad Usman was a Brigadier in the Indian Army. His father Subhanullah Ansari was also a politician and had a clean image. Mukhtar’s brother Sibgatullah Ansari is a member of Samajwadi Party and two-time MLA from 2007 to 2012.
Similarly, his family is indeed related to the family of Hamid Ansari, but they are not first cousins or direct uncle-nephew, as often alleged. According to available reports, they are distant relatives. Talking to newschecker, Shuaib Ansari, son of the elder brother of Mukhtar Ansari, has clarified that Hamid Ansari is a distant relative and not an immediate relative of Mukhtar Ansari.
Another member of the family said that Hamid Ansari and Mukhtar Ansari’s father Subhanullah Ansari were second cousins. Therefore, Hamid Ansari is not Mukhtar Ansari’s real uncle, but they belong to the same extended family. Hamid Ansari and Subhanullah Ansari are grandnephews of the freedom fighter Dr Mukhtar Ahmed Ansari.
Other well-known names from the clan include Jamia Millia founder and former Congress president Dr Mukhtar Ahmed Ansari, former MP and former governor Dr Shaukat-Ullah Shah Ansari, former Kerala Chief Justice M Ahmad Ansari, Justice Asif Ansari of Allahabad High Court, among others.
Due to the distant nature of the relationship between Hamid Ansari and Mukhtar Ansari, locals consider them not relatives. In an OpIndia ground report, one villager from Mau village had said that they merely belong to the same village, and have no blood relation.