A top gold smuggling syndicate, using specially designed brassieres and panties to smuggle gold paste into the country, has been busted. The criminal syndicate had hired women couriers wearing these special undergarments to smuggle gold in paste form. One of the key couriers, a 39-year-old woman, was arrested at Lucknow airport on Monday with 1,259 grams of yellow paste, hidden in a specially designed brassiere and panty.
Top sources in the Customs (Preventive) unit of Lucknow revealed that a young woman, originally hailing from Turkman Gate, Delhi, travelling from Dubai, landed from flight no FZ 8325 on April 26, 2021. Based on an intelligence input, she was intercepted while trying to exit from the airport. “When the women staff searched her, the yellow paste was recovered from the bra and panty worn by the courier. The yellow paste, packed in black polythene and stitched in her bra was recovered,” revealed a Customs source.
The accused was produced before the Special Chief Judicial Magistrate (Customs), Lucknow on April 27, wherein she was remanded to judicial custody.
Revealing the unique modus operandi of the smuggling syndicate, sources said that women couriers, in the form of passengers were sent to Dubai, from where they carried consignments of yellow gold paste, cleverly concealed in undergarments. The couriers were frequently flying to the UAE and returning to India through different airports. For instance, the woman bearing passport M6779486, arrested at Lucknow on April 26, had flown to Dubai several times. Before landing at Lucknow, in her earlier journey to UAE, she had returned through the Indira Gandhi International airport in Delhi on 6 January, 2021.
“We are trying to ascertain the kingpin of this syndicate and also the number of women couriers engaged in smuggling activities,” the source added.
Earlier on January 14 this year, two passengers, who had boarded an Air India Express flight, IX 1384 from Sharjah were arrested at Mangalore International airport. Both passengers were carrying gold paste, worth over ₹1 crore hidden in their undergarments. “Wherever one hides the gold, in whatever form, liquid or paste, he/she should be clear that we will trace it finally. Some smugglers have hidden gold paste packets in the rectum, but we recovered it,” said a Customs officer of the rank of Commissioner.
A confidential report of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) says that big-time crime syndicates operating across India are smuggling gold in a paste form to dodge metal detectors and hi-tech X-ray machines installed at all international airports. DRI report reveals that these syndicates, through this method, smuggle gold by converting the yellow metal into powder and compounds in a paste form. Once the consignment is smuggled, approximately 700 gm of gold per 1,000 gm of paste is retrieved from a chemical procedure. The gold, in pure form, is then handed over to the concerned party.
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