The Air Intelligence Unit of the Customs at Kempegowda International Airport intercepted three cases of smuggling over the week. On Friday, they arrested a Dubai-bound passenger from Kozhikode for concealing undeclared ₹32.25 lakh of foreign currency in the foam partition of his laptop bag.
On Thursday, officials recovered 3.03 kg of gold valued at ₹91 lakh from an Indigo aircraft. Two gold packages had been hidden below the wash basin in the washroom of the carrier, which had landed in the city from Dubai. The flight was to be routed as a domestic flight from Bengaluru to Jaipur.
It is suspected that gold was hidden there to be retrieved by either the ground staff or passengers travelling on the domestic leg of the flight, said officials. “The gold would have been retrieved by a passenger travelling from Bengaluru to Jaipur. As it would be a domestic flight, he would not have had to clear Customs,” said an official. AAirport ground staff and the crew of the carrier are being questioned.
“Airport Customs Officers with their proficiency and skills have been able to detect such concealments. In the past one month, this is the fourth case of gold seizure. Three cases, including the present one, have been in the Indigo flight coming from Dubai,” said Harsh Vardhan UMRE Additional Commissioner of Customs (Airport). In the third case, officials intercepted a passenger from Sri Lanka on Tuesday for trying to smuggle in gold bars concealed in his rectum. Two hundred grams of gold valued at ₹6.04 lakh was recovered.
