NEW DELHI: AIU officials believed Prajapati’s version and started making the panchnama. Sheikh, however, returned to the toilet after a while and confronted Prajapati. He told Sheikh that he had handed over the gold to the AIU officials.
In yet another case of an airport employee being involved in smuggling, the Air Intelligence Unit (AIU) of airport customs on Tuesday held a toilet cleaner for allegedly conniving in smuggling of gold worth over Rs48 lakh. This is the fourth such instance in the last one year, said officials.
As per information provided by the Additional Commissioner (airport customs), Milind Lanjewar, the gold was brought by a passenger, identified as Irfan Mohammed Sheikh, from Dubai in a Kuwait airways flight. The consignment was kept in two packets of 10 bars each, concealed with white adhesive tapes.
The officials said that on arriving at the airport, Sheikh saw the Immigration and Custom officials and started feeling nervous. He went to a toilet near the immigration counter and asked staffer Vicky Prajapati (28) to get the gold out of the premises in exchange of Rs30,000. “Not wanting to take any chances, Sheikh asked Prajapati to wait. He then came out to do a recce of the premises,” said Lanjewar.
He added, “When Sheikh did not return for 15-20 minutes, Prajapati hid one of the packets in a dustbin of a toilet cubicle and locked it from outside, and handed over the other packet to AIU, claiming he found it inside the toilet.”
AIU officials believed Prajapati’s version and started making the panchnama. Sheikh, however, returned to the toilet after a while and confronted Prajapati. He told Sheikh that he had handed over the gold to the AIU officials.
During the commotion, however, the officials heard about the other packet. On interrogation, Prajapati reportedly confessed about the hidden packet. Both were arrested and later released on bail.
