Gangster-politician Atiq Ahmad, who “feared” he would be killed on his way to Prayagraj, was on Wednesday brought back to the Sabarmati Central Jail in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, amid tight security, a day after a court in the Uttar Pradesh city sentenced him to life imprisonment in connection with the 2006 Umesh Pal kidnapping case.

Ahmad, a former Uttar Pradesh MLA and Lok Sabha MP was brought back to the high-security jail in Ahmedabad by UP Police after a nearly 24-hour-long road journey from Prayagraj, an official told PTI.

A video clip showed the UP police van ferrying the 60-year-old gangster-politician back to the jail.

On Sunday, while stepping out of the Sabarmati Central Jail, Ahmad claimed he might be murdered in an encounter like slain gangster Vikas Dubey or die in a staged accident on his way to Prayagraj.?

Ahmad was produced before a special court in Prayagraj on Tuesday that conducted a trial in a kidnapping case.

The special court held the former Lok Sabha MP and two others guilty in the 17-year-old criminal case and sentenced them to life imprisonment. They were pronounced guilty under the Indian Penal Code section 364-A (kidnapping or abduction in order to murder).

Atiq Ahmad has been jailed since June 2019 after the Supreme Court directed that the former MP from Phulpur in UP be shifted to a high-security facility in Gujarat after he was accused of orchestrating the kidnapping and assault on a real estate businessman, Mohit Jaiswal, while lodged in a prison in the northern state.

The former Samajwadi Party legislator is named in more than 100 criminal cases, and recently he was listed as an accused in the killing of Umesh Pal, a key witness in the 2006 BSP MLA Raju Pal murder case. Umesh Pal was gunned down last month in Prayagraj.

(With PTI inputs)