International gold smuggling racket busted in India
Gold biscuits smuggled from Lanka seized:
The Air Intelligence Unit of the Customs Department at the Tiruchi
airport, India have cracked an international gold smuggling racket and
seized around five kgs of gold biscuits smuggled from Sri Lanka.
The sleuths have arrested six Indian nationals for smuggling the gold
worth Indian Rs 9 million Tuesday.
The arrested persons had concealed the gold biscuits in their rectum
and were instructed to deliver the goods to certain persons in Chennai.
They landed in Tiruchi from Colombo and were planning to take the gold
to Chennai via road.
Customs Additional Commissioner Tiruchi D Sivasankaran, said based on
a specific tip-off they kept a surveillance on the arrival hall of the
airport.
They intercepted A Theen from Mannady, Chennai and R Salim, A Sagubar
Sathik, I Abdul Malik, A Abubacker and S Sagubar Sathik, all from
Ramnathapuram district.
Sivasankaran said all the six admitted to have smuggled gold biscuits
concealed in their rectum. They also voluntary retrieved the biscuits
and handed them over to the customs officials.
“In all there were 47 gold biscuits totally weighing 4.86 kgs valued
at Rs 89.9 lakhs,’’ he said.
They had not declared their possession of gold and attempted to evade
payment of duty for the gold.
The 47 gold biscuits, measuring approximately about 4 cm by 2 cm,
were placed in condoms and then pushed into thin polythene covers.
The six men then distributed the packets among themselves and hid
them in their rectum, the official said.
“Their instructors had not provided the identity of the persons who
would collect the gold at Chennai. All the six were photographed in
mobile phones which were sent to the receivers in Chennai, who would
pick up the smugglers at the airport,’’ the officials said. But the six
decided to take the road from Tiruchi, apparently suspecting that
security would be tight in Chennai airport.
Their flight took off from Colombo at 6.50 am. Sivasankaran said that
they were not habitual offenders and it was their first attempt at
smuggling. “They were textile traders who visited Sri Lanka a few times
and got acquainted with the anti-social elements. They were promised Rs
4,000 to 5,000 per person for delivering the gold,” he said. Times of
India
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