Rampur: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) took Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan into custody outside Rampur district jail on Saturday, minutes after he walked out of prison following nearly 11 months in custody, officials told the Press Trust of India (PTI). An official of the ED's Lucknow zonal office told Hindustan Times: "We have apprehended Azam Khan. After following arrest procedures, we will arrest him and produce him before the PMLA court in Ghaziabad."
The detention came just two days after the Allahabad High Court, on October 29, suspended the sentences of Azam Khan and his son Abdullah Azam and granted them bail in the dual PAN card case — while declining to stay their convictions, so their disqualification from contesting elections remains in force. Abdullah Azam was released and went home, the Times of India reported, while Rampur jail superintendent Rajesh Yadav confirmed the release of both men to the newspaper.
A separate money-laundering case
The ED action is in a separate case, not the PAN card matter. It stems from a 2019 Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) registered under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), relating to allegations of financial irregularities and land-grabbing linked to the Maulana Mohammad Ali Jauhar Trust and the Mohammad Ali Jauhar University it established in Rampur. These are allegations: Azam Khan has not been convicted in this case. Earlier this week, the ED attached properties linked to the university in the same probe.
The ED team had reached the jail before Khan's release, and around 24 CRPF personnel were deployed outside the prison, the Times of India reported. Officials told PTI the agency would seek Khan's remand from the special PMLA court in Ghaziabad for questioning. The Times of India also reported Khan remarking, as he was taken away, that this was "a punishment for being a Muslim" ("Musalmaan hone ki saza hai").
Khan, 78, a former Uttar Pradesh cabinet minister and former MP, had been lodged in Rampur jail since November 17, 2025. His release on Saturday therefore lasted only minutes before the ED took him into custody in the separate case — a fresh development in a legal battle that has kept one of Uttar Pradesh's most prominent opposition figures in and out of prison.