Prayagraj: The two missing minor sons of former Samajwadi Party Member of Parliament Atiq Ahmed are at a child protection home at Rajrooppur, police have told a local court.
The development comes a day after the Allahabad High Court reserved its verdict on a habeas corpus petition that their mother, Shaista Parveen, had filed.
The children have been missing for a month.
The Prayagraj Police informed the chief judicial magistrate of the children’s whereabouts in a report they submitted on the court’s orders.
In her petition, Parveen alleged that the children, studying in Class 11 and 9, were “illegally detained” on 24 February — the day that BJP leader and advocate Umesh Pal was shot dead.
BJP leader Pal was one of the witnesses in the 2005 murder of Bahujan Samaj Party legislator Raju Pal — a case in which gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmed and his brother and former MLA Khalid Azeem alias Ashraf are key suspects.
On 4 March, police told the court that the missing children were sent to a child protection home but they didn’t say which one, Dayashankar Mishra, one of Shaista’s lawyers, told ThePrint.
Her lawyers went about enquiring at both Rajrooppur and Khuldabad Child Protection Homes but were told that the children weren’t there, he said.
Speaking to ThePrint, Rakesh Maurya, the Station House Officer Dhoomanganj Police Station confirmed that the police had indeed informed the court of the children’s presence at the Rajrooppur home.
“We had earlier informed the court that the children were lodged in a child protection home. Now, this report has been filed on directions of the court,” he said.
Atiq Ahmed is currently lodged in Sabarmati jail in Ahmedabad. Earlier this month, he moved the Supreme Court to appeal against his transfer to a jail in Uttar Pradesh on the ground that he could be killed in an encounter.
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‘Abandoned’
In her petition before the CJM, Parveen asked the court to order the police to tell her about her children’s whereabouts.
The police had previously told the court that the children were found abandoned in the city’s Chakia area on 24 February, her lawyer Dayashankar Mishra said.
“The children are studying in a renowned school in classes 9 and 11 and had no criminal record. If they were found abandoned (and) they were not wanted in any case, the children should have been handed over to their guardians or relatives,” he said. “After so many days, they’ve (finally) acknowledged that they have been detained in the child protection home even though they had no criminal record.”
He said that the CJM had asked Parveen to file an application before the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) for her children’s custody.
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
Also Read: Why police think Atiq Ahmed went after Umesh Pal — ‘backstabbing’, property rivalry, court cases