Gold worth Rs 34 lakh seized at airport

The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence sleuths seized 1166.5 gram of gold worth Rs 34,17,845 found concealed in a drainage outlet of  a toilet at Mangaluru International Airport (MIA) on Friday.

Specific information received by DRI unit showed that a passenger (whose identity was not clearly known), who had arrived by Spicejet Flight No SG60 from Dubai to the airport, had dropped a packet containing the gold of foreign origin brought by him inside one of the toilets situated next to the immigration area of International arrivals, with a plan that the packet containing gold would be retrieved later by some cleaning staff having access to the toilet.

Search Operation

Acting on the information, the DRI officers rushed to the airport and conducted a thorough search. During the search operation, a small packet containing some metal objects wrapped in black insulation tapes was recovered from a drainage outlet of a toilet. On opening the packet, 10 gold bars of foreign origin were recovered. The contraband gold was later seized under the provisions of the Customs Act, 1962.