Man held with gold biscuits worth 1.97cr `

A passenger concealing 55 gold biscuits was caught by officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence on Thursday morning at the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport here. Officials said that the total worth of the seized gold is `1.97 crore.

Though initially, the passenger denied carrying any dutiable goods, officials found the concealed gold upon detailed examination of his baggage. “He (the passenger) tried to smuggle the gold biscuits into India by concealing them in his hand baggage. He had walked through the green channel without declaring the same to the Customs and thus become ineligible to bring gold in bullion form into the country,” said V. Chowdary, deputy director of the Hyderabad unit of the DRI.

The passenger, whose identity is yet to be revealed, was arrested under Section 104 of Customs Act and produced before the Special Judge for Economic Offences here which remanded him to judicial custody for 14 days, officials said. Meanwhile, Customs officials caught a woman passenger with 640 gm gold hidden in a carton box. “The gold was converted into foil paper and was carefully fixed in between the layers of the craft paper while manufacturing the carton box,” said a Customs officials explaining the latest modus operandi.

The passenger, Lubna Kausar Mohammed Parvez, a native of Mumbai, arrived from Dubai.

Ms Parvez was carrying one handbag and one carton-box which had been checked in. She opted to pass through the Green Channel. She was caught when her carton box was carefully examined by officials. The officers noticed the gold foils that had been concealed.