The Rise And Fall Of Atiq Ahmed

His rise in life was as dramatic as his end and the story of the rise and fall of Atiq Ahmed provides a perfect recipe for a Bollywood thriller

He was born in 1962 in a family with a modest background. His father drove a tonga for a living.

His rise in life was as dramatic as his end and the story of the rise and fall of Atiq Ahmed provides a perfect recipe for a Bollywood thriller.

Atiq, according to sources, detested poverty and after he failed in the high school examinations, he decided to tackle poverty in his own way.

He began by stealing coal from trains and selling it to make money. He soon moved to intimidating contractors to bag government tenders for railway scrap metal.

In 1979, Atiq, just 17 then, was accused of murder in Allahabad, now Prayagraj.

Soon, he was running a network of several gangsters in the state. His clout gradually spread to adjoining areas, including Phulpur and Kaushambhi.

In 1989, when his biggest rival, Shaukat Ilahi, was killed in a police encounter, Atiq became the undisputed king of the underworld.

The same year, Atiq, fought his first election from the Allahabad West Assembly seat as an Independent candidate and won.

In fact, he won this seat five consecutive times from 1989 to 2002 the first three times as an Independent, then as a Samajwadi Party contestant and finally as the Apna Dal nominee.

A year after he won as the Apna Dal candidate, Atiq went back to the Samajwadi Party and won the Phulpur Lok Sabha seat in 2004.

After he won, he had to vacate his Allahabad West Assembly seat, triggering a chain of events leading to the murder of BSP's Raju Pal, who won the subsequent by-election, a sensational crime in which Umesh Pal-killed on 24 February this year - was the main witness.

Atiq was arrested in 2005 for Raju Pal's murder and got bail three years later.

In or out of jail, Atiq maintained his sway over Uttar Pradesh's underworld and ensured his men were protected.