CHENNAI: Indian Air Intelligent Unit of Customs has tightened security on planes that arrive from abroad and continue on a domestic run immediately at Chennai Airport.
Officials have indicated that this is because of a rise in the number of cases where gold is brought by one courier and stashed on the plane in a pre-arranged spot, and picked up and taken out sans customs checks on the domestic run.
On Sunday afternoon, a stash of 1.6 kg gold was found on Jet Airways flight 9W 15, under a seat. The gold bars were found by a cleaner and the customs officials quickly took charge of it.
This is the fourth such incident in the last 6 weeks and understandably officials are working on breaking the tide. “Based on specific information from our sources and the CCTV footage that we actively monitor, we try to ascertain who is involved in this ring and who could possibly be the second courier,” said an official.
He added that at least 10 such cases were busted wide open last year, leading to arrests. Close to 50 kg of contraband gold has been apprehended by customs at the airport this year.
