Smuggled Gold Seized At Bhubaneswar Airport Again

Bhubaneswar: The sleuths of Air Intelligence Unit, Customs Department, seized gold worth Rs 9 lakh at Biju Patnaik International Airport here on Friday.

The custom officials detained a youth, carrying 301 grams gold inside the wheels of a trolley bag.

The passenger, who hails from Chennai, had arrived in an AirAsia flight from Kuala Lumpur.

It is suspected that the accused was smuggling the gold from Kuala Lumpur to Bhubaneswar, official sources said.

On April 22, a Non-Resident Indian (NRI) woman was detained by customs personnel for allegedly carrying illegal gold worth Rs 17 lakh. The woman, who had arrived in the city airport from Bangkok, was travelling on a Thai passport. Silver-coated gold chains and bangles were lalso recovered from her possession.

On April 9, the airport officials had seized 700 grams of gold valued at Rs 22 lakh while being smuggled inside a mixer grinder. Similarly, gold weighing 180 gram amounting to Rs 5.66 lakh was seized on April 1.

Earlier, gold bars and rings worth over Rs 12 lakh were seized from two persons at the airport on March 28.

During search of their body and personal baggage, the officials had found three gold bars which were concealed in their rectum and 143 gold rings inside the buttons of shirts and jeans pants. During examination, the seized ornaments were found to be of foreign origin smuggled into India.