3 Air India employees arrested for helping gold smugglers
Darpan News Desk IANS, 19 Nov, 2021 09:12 AM
Jaipur, Nov 19 (IANS) Three employees of Air India, accused of having a role in the smuggling of gold, have been arrested, officials said on Friday.
They have been accused of having a hand in a recent incident wherein 1.5 kg gold -- stored beneath an aircraft's seat -- was seized.
A passenger, who was later questioned in the matter, revealed the involvement of three employees of Air India.
All three of them have been arrested on charges of assisting in gold smuggling.
The Customs Department claims that the smugglers had brought gold worth Rs 75 lakh hidden under the seat with the help of the arrested individuals.
"...or else, it was not possible to hide the gold under the seat of the plane," an official said.
According to the information received, this is the first time that the collusion of airline employees has come to the fore in the case of gold smuggling.
On November 16, at Jaipur airport, the Customs team had seized gold from an aircraft.
A senior Customs official said that gold was hidden under the seat of the plane with the connivance of Shivram Meena, Gyanchand Meena and Kaushal Verma.
During questioning, it was revealed that they have been working for Air India for the last four years.
The minister and his son are accused in the October 3 incident in which nine persons, including four farmers, were mowed down by SUVs. The minister's son Ashish Mishra has already been arrested.
It's likely that Sidhu will put forth the list of demands in the Punjab government as he is upset with the appointments in the government. He has resigned from the post of state president, but it has not been accepted yet by Sonia Gandhi. The meeting gains significance as it comes ahead of the CWC meeting.
The civil secretariat houses the top offices of the government, including those of the Lt. Governor Manoj Sinha and his advisors. Police tried to intervene to restrain the mourners from carrying out the sit-in outside the civil secretariat.
"My son will go to the police tomorrow and assist the probe. He has not escaped anywhere," Mishra said on his arrival in Lucknow. He said that his son was very much in their house in Lakhimpur.
Punjab Congress President Navjot Singh Sidhu on Friday proceeded on indefinite fast in support of his demand for action against Ashish Mishra, the son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra and main accused in Sunday's violence in which nine persons, including four farmers, were killed.
Following a tipoff, the DRI sleuths swooped on the port on October 4 and detected the huge narcotics contraband, valued at Rs 125 crore, among boxes of a cooking oil container arriving from Iran and are now probing the possibility of a bigger drug smuggling racket with international ramifications for India and other countries.
