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$41k seized at Amritsar airport, 1 detained

$41k seized at Amritsar airport, 1 detained

Hindustan Times4 days ago

The Ludhiana regional unit of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) detained a passenger at Sri Guru Ram Dass Jee International Airport in Amritsar for attempting to smuggle 41,400 US dollars (approximately ₹35.40 lakh), concealed in his baggage.
The passenger, who was travelling to Dubai via Air India Express Flight IX 191 on May 29, was caught carrying $41,400, hidden inside an additional bag placed in his luggage. The concealed currency exceeded the permissible Reserve Bank of India (RBI) limit and was unaccounted for, prompting the DRI to seize it under provisions of the Customs Act, 1962.
Preliminary investigations indicate that the individual was engaged in the illegal smuggling of foreign currency for personal financial gain. Officials said that further probe was underway to unearth any broader network or involvement of others.
This is the second major seizure of foreign currency by the DRI within a month. On May 3, officials seized foreign currency worth ₹2.66 crore, arresting another individual from Amritsar airport in connection with the smuggling attempt.

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27 heading to aid site killed by Israeli forces, say Gaza officials
27 heading to aid site killed by Israeli forces, say Gaza officials

Hindustan Times

timean hour ago

  • Hindustan Times

27 heading to aid site killed by Israeli forces, say Gaza officials

Israeli forces fired on people as they headed toward an aid distribution site in Gaza on Tuesday, killing at least 27, Palestinian health officials and witnesses said, in the third such shooting in three days. The army said it fired 'near a few individual suspects' who left the designated route, approached its forces and ignored warning shots. The near-daily shootings have occurred after an Israeli and US-backed foundation established aid distribution points inside Israeli military zones, a system it says is designed to circumvent Hamas. The United Nations has rejected the new system, saying it doesn't address Gaza's mounting hunger crisis and allows Israel to use aid as a weapon. The Israeli military said it 'fired to drive away suspects." In a statement, army spokesperson Effie Defrin said "the numbers of casualties published by Hamas were exaggerated' but that the incident was being investigated. He said the army is not preventing Palestinians in Gaza from reaching aid in the distribution areas, but rather allowing it. The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which operates the sites, says there has been no violence in or around them. On Tuesday, it acknowledged that the Israeli military was investigating whether civilians were wounded 'after moving beyond the designated safe corridor and into a closed military zone,' in an area that was 'well beyond our secure distribution site.' A spokesperson for the group said it was 'saddened to learn that a number of civilians were injured and killed after moving beyond the designated safe corridor." Gaza's roughly 2 million people are almost completely reliant on international aid because Israel's offensive has destroyed nearly all of Gaza's food production capabilities. Israel imposed a blockade on supplies into Gaza in March, and limited aid began to enter again late last month after pressure from allies and warnings of famine. Witnesses have said the shootings all occurred at the Flag Roundabout, around a kilometer (half-mile) from one of the GHF's distribution sites in the now mostly uninhabited southern city of Rafah. The entire area is an Israeli military zone where journalists have no access outside of army-approved embeds. Yasser Abu Lubda, a 50-year-old displaced person from Rafah, said the shooting started around 4 a.m. Tuesday and he saw several people killed or wounded. Neima al-Aaraj, a woman from Khan Younis, said the Israeli fire was 'indiscriminate." She added that when she managed to reach the distribution site, there was no aid left. 'After the martyrs and wounded, I won't return,' she said. 'Either way we will die.' Rasha al-Nahal, another witness, said that 'there was gunfire from all directions.' She said she counted more than a dozen dead and several wounded along the road. When she reached the distribution site, she found there was no aid left, she said. She gathered pasta from the ground and salvaged rice from a bag that had been dropped and trampled upon. 'We'd rather die than deal with this," she said. "Death is more dignified than what's happening to us.' At least 27 people were killed early Tuesday, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. Hisham Mhanna, a spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross, confirmed the toll, saying its field hospital in Rafah received 184 wounded people, 19 of them declared dead on arrival, with eight others later dying of their wounds. The dead were transferred to Nasser Hospital in the city of Khan Younis. Three children and two women were among the dead, according to Mohammed Saqr, head of nursing at the hospital. Hospital director Atef al-Hout said most of the patients had gunshot wounds. An Associated Press reporter who arrived at the Red Cross field hospital at around 6 a.m. saw wounded people being transferred to other hospitals by ambulance. Outside, people were returning from the aid hub, mostly empty-handed, while empty flour bags stained with blood lay on the ground. Jeremy Laurence, a spokesman for the UN human rights office, told reporters it also had information indicating that 27 people were killed. 'Palestinians have been presented the grimmest of choices: die from starvation or risk being killed while trying to access the meager food that is being made available through Israel's militarized humanitarian assistance mechanism,' Volker Türk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a statement. The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said it distributed 21 truckloads of food at the Rafah site on Tuesday, while its other two operational sites were closed. During a ceasefire earlier this year, around 600 aid trucks entered Gaza daily. The Israeli military, meanwhile, said three of its soldiers were killed in northern Gaza, in what appeared to be the deadliest attack on Israel's forces since it ended a ceasefire with Hamas in March. The military said the soldiers, all in their early 20s, died during combat on Monday, without providing details. Israeli media reported they were killed in an explosion in the Jabaliya area. Israel ended the latest ceasefire after Hamas refused to change the agreement to release more hostages sooner. Israeli strikes have killed thousands of Palestinians since then, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. Israel says the new aid distribution system is designed to prevent Hamas from stealing aid. The UN says its own ability to deliver aid across Gaza has been hindered by Israeli restrictions, the breakdown of law and order and widespread looting, but that there's no evidence of systematic diversion of aid by Hamas. Hamas-led militants killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 people hostage in the Oct. 7, 2023, attack into southern Israel that ignited the war. They are still holding 58 hostages, a third of them believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals. Israel's military campaign has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza's Health Ministry, which doesn't say how many of the dead were civilians or combatants. The ministry is led by medical professionals but reports to the Hamas-run government. Its toll is seen as generally reliable by UN agencies and independent experts, though Israel has challenged its numbers. Israel says it has killed around 20,000 militants, without providing evidence. Around 860 Israeli soldiers have been killed since the Oct. 7 attack, including more than 400 during the fighting inside Gaza. Sirens sounded across Israel late Tuesday night. Israel's army said that two rockets were fired from Syria into open areas in the Israel-annexed Golan Heights, marking the first time a strike's been launched toward Israel from Syrian territory since the fall of former Syrian President Bashar Assad. A group calling itself the Mohammed Deif Brigades claimed the attack in a post on Telegram. Little is known about the group, which first surfaced on social media last month. Israel has been suspicious of the Islamist former insurgents who formed the new Syrian government and has launched hundreds of airstrikes on Syria and seized a UN-patrolled buffer zone on Syrian territory since Assad's fall. Syrian state TV reported Israeli shelling hit the western countryside of Syria's Daraa province after the rocket launch. Israel's defense minister said it holds Syria's president responsible for every threat and firing towards Israel, and that a 'full response' will come as soon as possible.

Ensure better coordination with state agencies to nab masterminds: Sitharaman to DRI officers
Ensure better coordination with state agencies to nab masterminds: Sitharaman to DRI officers

The Print

time8 hours ago

  • The Print

Ensure better coordination with state agencies to nab masterminds: Sitharaman to DRI officers

Sitharaman also asked the DRI officers to investigate 'holistically' keeping the big picture in focus and not merely chase 'isolated infractions'. Stressing that narcotics has become the 'biggest threat' and schools and colleges are the 'first victims' of drug abuse, Sitharaman said it is to be stopped by the DRI and then coordinated with the state police. 'We need to have greater coordination and greater understanding of the size as well as scope of the threat,' she added. New Delhi, Jun 3 (PTI) Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday asked revenue intelligence officers to develop better coordination with state and central agencies and expeditiously work on 'actionable intelligence' to nab masterminds behind smuggling syndicates. 'Leverage all available information and data on an entity, on an individual, and their behavioural patterns to uncover deeper systemic risks and threats by connecting latent dots. The goal must be to dismantle entire network and the syndicate, not just to intercept fragments,' Sitharaman told enforcement officers after inaugurating the new headquarters building of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI). She also said that DRI needs to have 'greater awareness and more actionable intelligence' and enforcement agencies should be 'smart enough' to decide on which information is actionable and which has to be taken up immediately from the dump of data which they receive. 'So, there is that area which I would still call as a grey area,' she said. Asking the DRI officers to go after masterminds of crime, she said 'no good if you catch the small fish… The bigger ones are the ones who are not being touched by many of our actions. We need to have the entire smuggling chain, entire nefarious operation chain, tracked and acted upon. It's not easy … but we should show some tangible results on it.' Last year, DRI seized 1,382 kg of gold in multiple operations in which key members of syndicates have been arrested and networks busted. During 2024, DRI seized 62 kg of heroin, 85 kg of cocaine, more than 10,000 kg of ganja and over 600 kg of synthetic drugs, including Ketamine, Methamphetamine and Ecstasy. Red-flagging that schools and colleges are being targeted by drug traffickers, the minister said DRI needs to coordinate with the state police officials or state law enforcement agencies to make them understand the 'gravity of the situation'. '…that is the other side of action on which a lot more thought and discussion should happen. Coordination with state law enforcing agencies is the grey area. I see that today even if you're able to stop such nefarious activities, the end result on the ground takes its own traction, and that has to be expedited,' Sitharaman said. DRI is a 'bulwark' on India's national security apparatus, she said, adding that the agency should deeply integrate modern technology into the system, besides forging stronger international partnerships. Sitharaman also highlighted three key imperatives for effective enforcement and secondly, investigations should be holistic, keeping the big picture in focus, not merely chasing isolated infractions. She said rules must be applied fairly, and consistently, and frauds must be caught swiftly. 'Do not view enforcement and facilitation as opposing ends of the spectrum. Robust intelligence framework that detects fraud is essential, not just to catch wrongdoers, but to create a level-playing field for the honest trade,' she said. And lastly, enforcement operations should be rooted not only in data but also in 'Dharma'. Set up in 1957, DRI, under the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC), is the 'key guardian' of the national economic frontier and is tasked with detecting smuggling, drug trafficking, illicit trade, and such threats. PTI JD CS HVA This report is auto-generated from PTI news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.

Kannada Actor's Mother Challenges Daughter's Prolonged Custody Despite Court-Granted Bail
Kannada Actor's Mother Challenges Daughter's Prolonged Custody Despite Court-Granted Bail

Hans India

time10 hours ago

  • Hans India

Kannada Actor's Mother Challenges Daughter's Prolonged Custody Despite Court-Granted Bail

The mother of Kannada film actress Ranya Rao has approached the Karnataka High Court with a habeas corpus petition, questioning the legality of her daughter's ongoing imprisonment despite being granted bail in a major gold smuggling investigation. The petition seeks immediate clarification regarding the extended custody period and challenges the circumstances preventing the actress's release. Ranya Rao received bail approval on May 20 from the Special Court for Economic Offences, yet remains behind bars due to additional charges filed under the Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act of 1974, commonly known as Cofeposa. This separate legal provision allows authorities to maintain preventive detention for individuals suspected of engaging in smuggling activities or actions that threaten foreign exchange conservation. The actress was apprehended at Bengaluru airport on March 3 following allegations of attempting to transport 14.8 kilograms of gold from Dubai. According to investigation reports, a thorough personal examination revealed gold bars strategically concealed around her waist and lower legs using medical bandages and tissues. Additional gold pieces and bars were discovered hidden within her footwear and clothing pockets. The confiscated gold, confirmed to be 24-carat quality, carries an estimated market value exceeding Rs 12.56 crore. The Special Court for Economic Offences granted bail to both Ranya Rao and co-accused Tarun Kondaru Raju after requiring each defendant to provide two guarantors and execute bonds worth Rs 2 lakh. The bail conditions specifically prohibit international travel and mandate that neither accused engage in similar offenses. Justice Vishwanath C Gowdar approved the bail following the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence's failure to submit required charge sheets within the legally mandated timeframe. During recent court proceedings, Additional Solicitor General Aravind Kamath informed the bench that formal objections had been submitted regarding the petition. The High Court has scheduled the next hearing for June 18 to address the mother's legal challenge. The case highlights the complex intersection of multiple legal frameworks in high-value smuggling cases, where bail in one proceeding may not guarantee immediate release due to overlapping charges under different statutes.

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