Florine Roche
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangalore

Mangalore, Jul 30: Till the other day people of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi were familiar only with the news of smugglers being caught along with the booty of smuggled gold. But the recent incident of the murder of two Kerala-based youth in a flat in Attavar has certainly come as a shocker giving us a peek into the enormity of the situation our country is faced with due to rampant smuggling of gold. Air passengers smuggle the yellow metal by shaping into a wire, chains, hidden in undergarments, in seed-shaped chips, dates, ground into granules, powered and mixed with other metals or gold converted into belt buckles, hidden in shoes, in the form of embroidery in lady’s bags, in the form of silver coated biscuits or gold packaged in electronic items and through many other novel ways.

Apart from the surge in smuggling of the precious metal there is a new trend where smugglers are making use of young women as carriers thinking they are safer than men to carry out their illegal activity.

It is estimated that about 700 kg of gold is smuggled into India on a daily basis which shows that smuggling is rampant and that bigwigs are involved in it. Financial Intelligence officials expressed concern saying the country has not seen such a sharp rise in contraband gold in over two decades as smuggling is believed to have risen from 300% between March 2013 and April 2014.

Smugglers target air passengers as carriers

Such a vast amount of gold coming into the country does not augur well for Indian economy especially at a time when the government introduced 10% import duty on gold in August 2013 to curb escalated Current Account Deficit. Though gold smuggling incidents are common in major airports across the country, Mangalore International Airport is regularly trapping international air passengers who smuggle gold while many more may succeed in their mission.

Mangalore International Airport is witnessing such huge haul of smuggled gold mainly because there is a huge gold smuggling racket operating between Kozhikode-Mangalore-Dubai sector and many passengers agree to be carriers of smuggled gold for the greed of money offered by these smugglers. While many succeed in deluding the customs and DRI officials some get caught though they employ ingenious ways to smuggle the yellow metal. The recent news of a passenger placing a gold bar in the dustbin and more recently kg gold in the toilet drainage at Mangalore International Airport laid bare the fact that smuggling of gold is widespread.

Most passengers who are caught smuggling gold at Mangalore International Airport belong to our neighboring state Kerala. This modus operandi gives credence to the fact that there is a strong nexus between passengers who act as carriers and the smuggling racket which is quite active in Kerala. With this background the recent news of the murder of two Kerala youth who worked as carriers for smuggling gold from Gulf by suspected members of their gang, has come as a shocker for many. The youth who were alleged carriers, got greedy and sold the gold they had smuggled through Bangaloroe International Airport, instead of handing over the same to the kingpin of the gang in Kerala and lost their lives.

Just a week after this horrendous crime another incident has come to light wherein gold worth Rs. 31 lakh was recovered by DRI from the drainage hole of the toilet at Mangalore International Airport. In both these incidents the gold was supposed to be delivered to the chelas of certain smugglers operating between Dubai and Mangalore-Kozhikode.

No Sympathy

Whenever we come across incidents of travelers especially youngsters being caught in the smuggling imbroglio the general public sympathize with them for getting caught and losing the gold or for their ignorance in brushing shoulders with the law of the country jeopardizing their careers. In actuality, the truth is completely different from what meets the eye, say DRI officials who have been witnessing these incidents on a regular basis at various airports.

A top DRI official in Mangalore who did not want to be named, states, "It is wrong to sympathize with these carriers because they are not innocent as we assume them to be. They are professional smugglers who act as carriers for the lure of money. These smugglers are anti-national elements because they get into these anti-national activities fully knowing the consequence of their commission and omission. There is a big racket operating systematically at international arena and some of the travelers who want to become suddenly rich fall prey to the machinations of these smugglers and agree to be carriers to pocket the huge commission they are assured of."

DRI officials say that smugglers are taking advantage of the loopholes in the law by making use of airlines that club international routes with domestic fliers using the same flight.

In fact, it is not possible to ascertain the exact percentage of carriers succeeding in escaping from the eagle eyes of the customs and Directorate of intelligence officials. At the same time it cannot be denied that many carriers have succeeded in their covert mission like the two youth from Kerala who smuggled almost 3 kg of gold through Bangalore International Airport and paid with their lives. Many a time even modern technology comes a cropper in detecting smuggled gold and it is this success of escaping more than being caught, which must be prompting the smugglers to go for the kill.

Moreover, it is estimated that only 12% of the gold smuggled through airport is detected which means that the profit is huge and the smugglers have tasted blood. So, one can imagine the amount of gold that enters the country illegally despite strict vigilance. In fact gold smuggling through airports in the last one year is at its highest in the last two decades and this is mainly attributed to the sharp increase in import duty which was hiked from 2% to 10% in 2013.

The other worrying factor for enforcement officials is that there is the possibility of today’s carriers becoming professional smugglers of tomorrow, a trend which is increasingly becoming a reality. Carriers who get caught are naturally trapped in the cobweb of law from which they cannot easily run off and officials are concerned that these elements might pose serious threat to the unity, integrity and security of the country.

What happens to smuggled gold?

A carrier who is caught smuggling is produced before the court and he will be able to get a bail only if the smuggled gold is less than the value of Rs. 1 crore. The confiscated gold is then checked for purification with the help of a professional goldsmith and will be housed at the locker of the customs office situated in Panambur. It must be remembered that the onus of proving that the gold confiscated rightfully belongs to him/her rests with the accused person if he has to reclaim the confiscated gold.
This does not happen because smugglers who are caught will have to cough up import duty, penalty and also redemption charges and therefore there is nothing that he is going to gain by reclaiming it. Therefore most carriers who are caught don’t take the trouble of repossessing the confiscated gold. So finally the gold goes to the government.

What happens to the smuggled gold? In what way the smugglers are benefitted? The smuggled gold is clandestinely bought by big jewelers. As per law jewelry shops have to buy gold from the banks for their needs. The law also states that every time they purchase gold they have to export 80% of the gold they purchase, which is not possible. To meet their demands the jewelers go to smugglers where they can get the gold easily and at a much lower price than they buy from banks. This works out to the mutual advantage of both the parties. In the process, the government is deprived of the tax and black money is also generated.

The hike in import duty in 2013 has brought down gold imports considerably. It was widely expected that the new NDA government would reduce the import duty in the recent budget which would have curbed smuggling activity to some extent. It was a shocker when the government snubbed jewelry makers and decided to continue the status quo.