LUCKNOW The Chaudhary Charan Singh Airport (CCSA) in Lucknow has turned into a major transit point for gold smugglers during the last five years. Since 2018, the customs department has arrested over 100 carriers and seized around 225 kg of smuggled yellow metal worth around ₹120 crore from them.
Around 56.97 kg of smuggled gold was seized in 2018-19, 51.73 kg in 2019-20, 26.62 kg in 2020-21, 47.67 kg in 2021-22 and 52 kg in 2022-23 by customs officials from the airport. From January to July 2023, more than 30 kg of gold was seized from smugglers, said a customs department official at Lucknow airport.
Before international flights started from Lucknow, most of the gold smuggling was done through Mumbai. But after strictness at bigger airports like Mumbai and Delhi, smugglers found smaller airports like Lucknow or Varanasi more feasible for them, said officials.
Smuggling of the yellow metal is more from Gulf countries as gold rates are much lower there.
Gold costs between ₹45-50 lakh per kg in Gulf countries. If brought to India legally, then 3% GST is added to the cost apart from 7.5% customs duty and 2.5% agriculture infrastructure and development cess, taking the figure to around ₹60 lakh per kg here. But when it is smuggled, there is a net profit of ₹5 to 7 lakh per kg for smugglers, said officials.
Most of the smuggled gold is coming from Saudi Arabia, Muscat, Dubai and sometimes from Bangkok. But this is only 10 to 15% of the total gold being smuggled, which could be caught, according to experts.
{{/usCountry}}Most of the smuggled gold is coming from Saudi Arabia, Muscat, Dubai and sometimes from Bangkok. But this is only 10 to 15% of the total gold being smuggled, which could be caught, according to experts.
{{/usCountry}}The modus operandi of smugglers keeps changing. A senior customs official said, “Most of the people caught with gold are couriers of big smugglers. They are trained before they are sent with the consignment. The smugglers are clever…they know that they will go to jail only when they are carrying gold over ₹50 lakh. To avoid arrest, most of them carry around 750 gms of gold, which comes under ₹50 lakh bracket.”
The customs department has prepared a list of “repeat offenders” who are caught smuggling gold to India. A list of 107 passengers suspected of smuggling has been sent to the regional passport office recommending cancellation of their passports.
Several passengers, whose names have been shared by the department, have been served notices and asked to appear before officials or face seizure of passports.
The biggest worry is that gold smugglers have started using women as their couriers. Nowadays, people are also carrying gold in liquid/paste form and get gold carefully placed inside their rectum, which is hard to detect even for scanners, said officials.
Intelligence agencies are collecting details of all passengers who have visited Gulf countries, especially Dubai, 10 or more times.
Assistant commissioner of customs (Lucknow airport) AN Haq said, “Customs officials are always alert to stop any sort of smuggling efforts.”