Mumbai: DRI seizes Dubai origin smuggled gold worth Rs 8.93 crore from melting unit, seven held
The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) recovered Dubai origin smuggled gold worth Rs 8.93 crore from a gold melting unit in South Mumbai and arrested seven persons allegedly part of a smuggling racket.
The owner of the melting facility is also among the persons arrested.
The racket was involved in processing of gold smuggled from Dubai into India via carrier passengers recruited by an organized syndicate.
DRI codenamed the operation as 'Operation Alchemist'.
Sources said while investigating some of the gold smuggling cases in which foreign national are used for smuggling the foreign origin gold into India via Mumbai airport, DRI developed intelligence about the members of a racket which would accept smuggled foreign origin gold from the airport staff and later melt it at a gold melting unit in South Mumbai and convert them into gold bars before selling them in grey market.
Acting on the intelligence, the DRI team on Sunday raided a melting unit on the sixth floor of a building on Kazi Syed Street, in Masjid Bunder area and nabbed five people from the melting unit and seized six bars of 8,747 g gold worth Rs 8.93 crore.
The arrested were identified as Mininath Bhule, Vishwas Ramchandra Yadav alias Amol, Uday Deepak Jangam, Rohit Mohite and Vikram Balkrishna Mote.
A source said that Bhule would allegedly take delivery of the smuggled gold from the airport staff and after melting it he further delivered it to the prospective buyers.
Besides him, Yadav would allegedly manage all the accounting of the smuggled gold, while Jangam and Mohite allegedly melt the smuggled gold at the melting facility. Mote, a driver, allegedly used to collect smuggled gold from the airport, sources said.
The accused failed to show any documents in support of the seized gold, thus making the agency believe the seized yellow metal is foreign-origin smuggled gold, sources added.
Further interrogation of the accused led to the arrest of Rajkumar Pawar, the owner of the melting unit and Ravinder Salunkhe, a driver and an alleged member of the racket.
The DRI has arrested the accused on charges of committing a non-bailable offence under the Customs Act.
The DRI suspects that the arrested accused are members of an international smuggling syndicate and have committed serious economic offenses.
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