DHAKA: Bangladesh Customs arrested over 272 Biman officers with staff on charged of gold smuggling through three Bangladesh International Airports.
The Biman employees include five pilots, four co-pilots, 25 cabin crews, 15 flight stewards, five chief pursers, three flight pursers and seven junior pursers, custom officer said.
Thirty syndicate are behind the crime. Several staffers of the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh are also a party to it.
An intelligence agency submitted the report to the Prime Minister’s Office recently. It was forwarded to the home ministry on December 18, asking the ministry to take action against those involved.
The report said 44 officials, including two pilots and 34 cabin crews of the national flag carrier, fled the country after five people were arrested over gold smuggling on November 18 last year.
Three of the five are Biman top dogs. They are Captain Abu Mohammad AslamShaheed, chief of planning and scheduling, EmdadHossain, deputy general manager (flight services), and TozammelHossain, manager (scheduling).
The absence of the 44 officials badly affected flight operations and tarnished the government’s image abroad, the report added.
Asked about this, Biman General Manager of Public Relations Khan Musharraf Hossain said none of their employees fled the country.
The cabin crews were posted outside the country at the time of the November 18 arrests, he said, adding, “It’s not right to call them fugitives.”
This newspaper could not verify either claim fully, but found several Biman employees stopped coming to work.
According to the report, about 80 percent of the gold smugglers in the country are based in Chittagong.
Gold enters Bangladesh directly from Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Oman or via Singapore and Malaysia. But Bangladesh is not the final destination — it is only a route to smuggle the yellow metal through land ports to India, where gold is used particularly in weddings and religious festivals.
Unscrupulous Biman officials get Tk 1,000 to 1,500 for each 10-tola gold bar to pass through airports. The gold is smuggled through Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka, Shah Amanat International Airport in Chittagong and Osmani International Airport in Sylhet.
Of the 30 syndicates involved, 23 operate inside the country and the rest from outside.
Of the 23 rings at home, 11 are directly involved in gold smuggling and 12 are smuggling gold with money exchange as front business.
And of the 11 directly involved, seven are active at Shahjalal International Airport, three at Shah Amanat International Airport and one at Osmani International Airport.
The rackets are backed by some political leaders and top officials in the police and Border Guard Bangladesh.
