Siliguri: The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) seized smuggled gold, this time from heart of Siliguri, on Wednesday. This was the second successive haul of the precious metal by the central agency within a week.
The team acted on a tip-off and impounded gold bars weighing 10.5kg from four persons, who are residents of Mizoram and had come here with the consignment on Thursday. They were staying at a hotel near Siliguri Junction station.
Those arrested have been identified as Jason Lalthlamuaua, Laldavida and Lalpekkima- residents of Aizwal and C. Lalduha of Champai district- all in Mizoram. The valuation of the seized gold is Rs 3.32 crore, DRI sources said.
"The DRI team conducted raid at the hotel where the quartet was staying. During the raid, the gold bars, which were hidden in waist belts and shoes, were seized. They had painted their vests and belts in yellow so that the bars could not be seen from outside," said Arunprasad Majumdar, the lawyer representing the DRI.
Charges under section 104 of the Customs Act, 1962 have been brought against them.
On July 7, DRI had arrested two residents of Bihar from a place near Phansidewa on Siliguri outskirts and had seized similar quantity of gold worth Rs 3.18 crore.
"The four are suspected to be members of an international gold smuggling racket that is operating in this region using Siliguri as corridor for smuggling of gold. They were planning to smuggle the gold to Calcutta, before that the DRI team managed to caught them," the lawyer said.
They were produced at a court here on Thursday and were sent to judicial custody for 14 days. Jewellers based in Siliguri, when asked about the rise in gold smuggling, said this is because of the increase in demand of the metal and rise in its import duty.Sources in intelligence agencies, when asked about the rise in incidents of seizures, said some of the rackets dealing in gold smuggling get the gold delivered in northeast from Myanmar. Recently, they said, around 32kg of gold was smuggled from China to Sikkim. It was seized and three residents of Maharastra were arrested. "The plan is to take the smuggled gold to metros like Mumbai and Calcutta, using Siliguri as a corridor," said the source.
Source: telegraphindia.com