KOCHI: When people like Swapna Prabha Suresh, the second accused in the Thiruvananthapuram gold smuggling case, employ various channels to facilitate bullion smuggling, there are several skillful hands behind the curtain who turn gold bars into any form to help carriers evade the eagle eye at airports. From liquid form to parts of electronic goods, these persons are masters of the trade on whose ‘expertise’ gold smuggling syndicates survive.
Sayeed Muhammad -- who had worked with various enforcement agencies, including Customs, Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) and Enforcement Directorate (ED), while in service -- claimed that there are small-sized workshops in the UAE and fellow Gulf countries where works on gold take place. “These persons have the equipment needed to mould gold into any shape. They know how to handle chemicals. Some of their employees have worked there for several years and they invent newer and newer modes to smuggle in the gold.
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Most of them are from Kerala. They make pin, liquid, wires, coils, spares of electronic products in gold which are difficult to detect. Smugglers frequently make changes to their smuggling pattern to outwit the checking at airports,” he said. Sayeed Muhammad said it didn’t appear that traditional goldsmiths are employed by the smugglers to work abroad. “I think the people who are moulding the gold into various forms are not traditional goldsmiths. There had been an investigation in this regard in the past but no concrete information emerged,” he said.
These days, smugglers turn gold into paste form which is extremely difficult to detect using the scanners at airports. According to a Customs officer, expertise is needed for this. Similarly, retrieving the gold from paste form is a complex procedure. “Since 2018, gold in paste form started to hit the airports. Now, in around 40 per cent of the cases registered, gold in paste form was seized. In the initial stages, even agencies here were clueless on retrieving gold from the seized paste form.
The gold paste is filled in capsules or packets and concealed in pouches which can be worn at the waist. Some hide the small capsules in their body cavities,” he said A Customs official said the gold is melted at high temperature for hours before impurities are added to turn it into paste form. Later, the solution is dyed to conceal it inside pouches. Once it is smuggled in, the gold is again heated and turned into powder form before it is cleaned using a chemical solution from which gold can be retrieved. “Earlier, gold bars were smuggled in by concealing them inside TV sets, CD players and audio sets. But after new techniques of moulding gold into different forms emerged, the smuggling of gold in bars has come down,” he said.