Two Customs officials working at the Mumbai international airport were transferred on Tuesday for failing to detect various smuggling attempts made on the night of October 25. Those attempting to smuggle goods were eventually caught by a team of officials, who were conducting a special
drive on the same night. Officials, who were part of the drive, registered 33 cases of smuggling on that night.
Following the success of the drive, the two officials - a superintendent and a public relations officer - were transferred because the cases were registered when they were on duty.
Among those caught were three groups of professional carriers, who had travelled with various goods. "The groups had five, eight and 11 members respectively and were coming from Dubai, Bangkok and Hong Kong," said an official from the Air Intelligence Unit (AIU) of Customs.
He added the groups had brought items worth around Rs 40 lakh.
The cases were registered under the Import Trade Control, under which passengers attempting to evade duty are fined and penalised. Though most of them paid a fine to get their goods released, two LED television sets, each costing around Rs3 lakh, remained unclaimed.
"A 33-year-old woman, who was part of one of the groups came on Monday and collected the television sets by paying a fine ," the official said.
He added that the woman said she had carried the television sets from Bangkok for somebody else in lieu of a free ticket. "She did not want her passport to be blacklisted, which would have happened if she had not collected the television sets," the official said, adding that the tags bearing her name were attached with the television sets.
|