The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) busted a syndicate involved in smuggling foreign-origin gold through land and train routes from three locations. They seized 31.7 kg of gold worth ₹19 crore from Mumbai, Nagpur and Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh on October 13 and 14.
Acting on specific intelligence, the Nagpur DRI team apprehended two carriers of gold when they alighted at Nagpur Railway station from a train that started from Kolkata. The team recovered 8.5 kg of foreign-marked gold from the duo. After interrogating the duo, two receivers of the smuggled gold were also identified and apprehended, officials said.
The agency’s Varanasi team apprehended two others when they were travelling in Uttar Pradesh in a car, after a three-hour chase on the road and a search operation inside the forest, with the help of local police. It recovered 18.2 kg of gold from the two persons. The yellow metal was concealed in a cavity made below the handbrake of the car.
The Mumbai team managed to trace five accused in Mumbai after they had travelled from Varanasi by train, carrying 4.9 kg of gold.
Eleven persons were arrested in the operation, of whom five were apprehended in Mumbai, two in Varanasi and four in Nagpur, the DRI officials said.
An interrogation of the accused revealed that the syndicate used to smuggle gold into India via the borders of Bangladesh and further diverted the same to Mumbai, Nagpur, Varanasi and other major cities.
