Spike in gold smuggling cases at Pune airport

Masterminds at large

Customs officials have arrested 23 people for carrying gold in the 26 cases since April 1. Of them, only two are from Pune and about 16 are from Mumbai and Thane. Also, two are from Aurangabad, one from Odisha, one from Gujarat and one from Kozhikode in Kerala. Interrogations revealed they were to deliver the gold smuggled from Dubai to “receivers” mainly in Mumbai and South India. However, the investigators could not reach their masterminds in Dubai or in India.

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Most of these “carriers” are from the middle-class. Two women, Sangeeta Panjari (48) and her sister Mangal Sarmalkar (46) — arrested at the Pune airport with 36 gold biscuits weighing 4.2 kg valued at Rs 1.1 crore — were from lower middle-class families in Mumbai. Officials are zeroing in on who booked their tickets. Their phone call records are being checked to reach the racketeers. Officials said international hawala racketeers lure low-profile “carriers” by paying them a few thousand rupees for smuggling huge gold consignments. “There is a big chain involved. The carriers are at the end of this chain having international links. It is not easy to reach the kingpins,” said V S Rao, Commissioner of Customs, Pune.

Modus operandi

Of the 26 cases at Pune airport, in 13 incidents the “carriers” had actually concealed the gold in their rectum. Rao said racketeers try different modus operandi, for example Zarina Banu Mansuri of Mumbai came from Dubai to Pune on October 19 with gold plates concealed in a 32-inch LED flat screen television. “Our officers did a good job by detecting this case,” he said.

Two others carried 18 gold biscuits each in packets wrapped with adhesive tapes and concealed in the denim shorts worn by them underneath their salwar kurtas. Pune-based I M Kadri, arrested on October 14, was carrying gold plates in four powder tins and a thermos flask from Dubai. On July 7, gold was recovered from the safety life jacket bag under seat No. 14 of an aircraft. Similarly, gold biscuits were found stuck on the backside of a mirror inside an aircraft lavatory on September 15. Officials had recovered 1 kg gold from a cupboard below the basin of a gents toilet at the airport on April 19.

Most gold ‘carriers’ used SpiceJet flight: Customs

The probe revealed 20 gold “carriers” arrested by Customs had come from Dubai to Pune by SpiceJet flight SG-52. The incidents of seizure of gold from safety life jacket and lavatory were also reported on the same flight. In a few cases, the carriers had arrived on Air India and Jet Airways flights. Officials said the racketeers might be hiding the smuggled gold in the SpiceJet aircraft because it becomes a domestic flight after reaching Pune. So, there is a possibility that the “carrier” again boards the same flight to reach another city in India and step out with gold as a domestic passenger, avoiding immigration checks.

In a press release on October 28, K P Singh, additional commissioner (customs), stated, “A number of cases of unsuccessful attempts to smuggle gold have been made by unscrupulous elements in the recent past from Pune airport and, coincidentally, such passengers arrived from this very SpiceJet aircraft coming from Dubai…”

A SpiceJet spokesperson said, “Amongst all the airlines in India, SpiceJet has the highest frequency of five-days-a-week flights in the Pune-Dubai sector. Hence, maximum passengers opt for our flights to travel on this route and the route has always witnessed high seat occupancy. Moreover, in all of the gold smuggling cases reported, the passengers have always carried the gold in person. And the airline or its crew members have never been held guilty for wrongdoing by the relevant investigating authorities. Also, scrutinising and frisking of customer and his baggage at the airports is managed and controlled by airport and the concerned authorities and not the airline.”

At a glance:

2013-14:

6 cases of gold smuggling. 3.73-kg gold worth Rs 1.1 crore recovered

2014-15:

23 cases of gold smuggling. 33.5-kg gold worth Rs 9.18 crore recovered

April-Oct, 2015:

26 cases of gold smuggling. 15.5-kg gold worth Rs 4.43 crore recovered