Municipal VC’S son held over gold smuggling

KOCHI: Ater raiding the residence of Thrikkakkara municipality Vice Chairman (VC) AA Ibrahim Kuty, Customs officials on Thursday arrested his son and a film producer in connection with a failed bid to smuggle 2.23kg of gold through Cochin International Airport last week.

Customs had seized the gold from a meat cuting machine at the cargo terminal of the airport.

KP Sirajuddin, producer of films like Vaanku and Charminar, and Shabin, son of Kuty, were arrested from Kochi by Customs on Thursday.

Kuty had come out in defense of his son claiming that he was innocent. Customs officials had feared that Sirajuddin managed to flee the country.

Nakulan, the driver who came to the airport to collect the parcel, was arrested on Saturday.

On Tuesday, Customs officials conducted raids at the houses of Sirajuddin and Shabin and recovered laptops, two mobile phones and a hard disk used by the culprits.

The officials have confiscated the passports of Shabin and co-accused Sirajuddin.

The duo was on the watch list of Customs following rapid growth of their business firms.

Small-time businessmen, their expansion and success were at an unprecedented rate. According to the officials, gold smuggling led to the high-speed growth of their business.

Sirajuddin and Shabin have together smuggled gold through the airport earlier too.

They carried out smuggling on the pretext of importing machine parts.

In the latest incident, they smuggled gold in a meat-cuting machine.

The machine had arrived on an Air India cargo flight on Saturday night.

Ater routine inspections at the cargo terminal, the machine was handed over to Nakulan, who had reached the airport to take possession of the machine. Nakulan loaded the cargo on a vehicle and had passed the gate of the cargo terminal when Customs officers received a message that gold was concealed in the machine.

Immediately, the Customs team chased Nakulan’s vehicle and blocked it.

The vehicle carrying the meat slicer was directed back to the cargo terminal and the machine was subjected to a thorough examination.

Soon, two gold bars weighing 1kg each and two small gold “biscuits” were confiscated.

Nakulan was taken into custody. The gold weighing 2.25kg was moulded into bar shape and was neatly hidden inside the meat-cuting machine.

The questioning of Nakulan threw more light into the operation of the gold smuggling racket.