MUMBAI: The airport Customs arrested two flyers and seized gold bars worth Rs 33 lakh from them at international airport on Wednesday. The two were trying to smuggle the gold in the country after concealing it inside a computer CPU and a cooking pan. A passenger, Hiren Chauhan, was travelling on Indian passport and he was intercepted at the airport after in-line screening machine indicated that he had concealed gold in his baggage. During the examining the Customs officials recovered 10 gold bars, 116 GMs each worth Rs 27.88 lakhs from him.
Commissioner of Customs (airport) A P S Suri stated that Chauhan arrived from Dubai and he had concealed 1.11 kg gold bars inside a transformer of a desktop CPU.
Mumbai airport Customs had adopted the advanced in-line screening system few years ago which detect gold hidden in passengers’ baggage.An officer explained that after arrival of aircrafts, airline employees keep all the checked in bags on belts which passed through the in-line screening machine. The machine identifies bags containing gold inside and the Customs officials monitoring the process, put mark on the suspicious bags.
Passenger collects their bags from the belts and walk through the green channels, where the Customs officials identifies the suspicious passengers with the help of mark on their bags and intercept them for examination.
In second case, a flyer, Mannil Kadavan, arrived from Doha and he was walking out of the airport after carrying an aluminium cooking pan in his hand bag. The screening machine at the gate indicated the Customs officials that he was carrying gold inside the handbag. “We examined his bag and found the gold bars (232.3 grm) were concealed in handle of the pan” said Milind Lanjewar, additional commissioner Customs.
In another instance, the airport Customs seized 350 grm gold worth Rs 8.74 lakh from a woman flyer, Safia Sharif Mohammed. She was travelling on British passport and arrived from Sharjah.
