Attempt to smuggle gold bar, coin in sandals foiled at Mangalore International Airport

Bellevision Media Network

Mangalore, 13 Nov 2013: Gold smugglers are getting more ingenious, and equal to the task are officials of customs and directorate of revenue intelligence. After vain efforts to smuggle in gold in the hollow of clothes drying rack in the recent past, a passenger who tried to smuggle a gold tola bar and gold sovereign coin in his sandals become the last air passenger to be apprehended by the sleuths at Mangalore International Airport (MIA) at Kenjar here on Wednesday.

 

 

In a joint operation, sleuths of customs and DRI apprehended Manazir Hassan, a resident of Bhatkal in Uttara Kannada district on charges of trying to smuggle the gold tola bar weighing 116.64 grams with marking Suisse fine gold 999.0 and old gold sovereign coin weighing eight grams. The total value of the gold seized by these agencies is Rs 3.84-lakh. Manazir had arrived at MIA on board the Air India Express flight IX 814 at around 8.15am.

 

Sources in these agencies told that they stopped Manazir based on credible information that he was attempting to smuggle gold. However a thorough search of Manazir and the luggage that he was carrying yielded nothing, but for purchase slips for the gold, which he claimed were made by his friend, the sources said, adding that the passenger also starting throwing his weight around alleging that the officials were needlessly harassing him.

 

As an afterthought, when the officials put his sandals through the x-ray scanner, they detected the gold. Sources said Manzair had carefully slit open a small hole in the inner part of the strap of the sandal that he wore on the right feet and stashed the gold bar and coin inside that. Sources said normally footwear (sandals) of passengers except for shoes and sneakers are not examined, except in case of doubt.