The special squad of the Railway Protection Force (RPF) on Monday foiled what is believed to be an attempt at tax invasion when they detained a person who was allegedly carrying an illegal consignment of gold ornaments worth over ₹30.50 lakh.
Sandeep Dolai, 20, a resident of West Bengal and an employee at a Thrissur-based ornament making firm, was intercepted in the second class compartment of the Kannur-Alappuzha Express shortly after the train had passed Aluva station. According to RPF sources, he was found hiding around 763.16 grams of gold ornaments in a bag and in person and had no documents to show for them. RPF suspects it to be an attempt at evading tax under the Goods and Services Tax. ), which would have inflicted considerable revenue loss to the government exchequer. The ornaments were being transported from Thrissur to be supplied to various jewellers across major cities in the State, said RPF sources.
“The detainee was found to be working in a Thrissur-based ornament making firm, run also by a resident of West Bengal. From our preliminary interrogation we suspect that they had been doing this for a while,” said T.S. Gopakumar, Assistant Commissioner, RPF, Ernakulam.
The gold ornaments seized along with the detained person has been handed over to the State GST authorities in Ernakulam.
The RPF special squad formed at the direction of Birendra Kumar, Inspector General, RPF, Southern Railway, had been very active in detecting suspicious activities. The squad has been on high alert considering the ongoing Sabarimala pilgrimage season.
A few days ago, the anti-narcotic squad of RPF had foiled a similar tax evasion attempt when they detained a person with silver ornaments worth over ₹5 lakh.
The instant case was detected by the squad comprising Sub Inspector P.V. Raju, head constables Saji Augustine, Aneesh.M.H and Madhu, and constables Sreenivas and Suresh Abraham.
