India revises guidelines to speed up trial process in gold smuggling cases

NEW DELHI (Scrap Monster): The Indian Finance Ministry has issued new guidelines to speed up the trial process in gold smuggling cases. The revision to its earlier guidelines issued almost a year before, states that prosecution could be launched soon after issuance of show cause notices in the case of accused related with gold smuggling acts.

Under normal circumstances, prosecution could be launched only upon completion of adjudication proceedings. The new directive issued by the Ministry to the Customs Department states that prosecution could be launched immediately upon issuing show cause notice in cases of offences involving gold. The new directive comes in the wake of observations that delay in prosecution aids criminals to escape through loopholes. Welcoming the new move, the Customs Department officials stated that the new move would help to curb gold smuggling acts and would also ensure that offenders receive maximum punishment at the earliest.

Incidentally, there has been a rise in gold smuggling, especially in South Indian states with the advent of festive season. As per reports, some jewellers prefer to buy smuggled gold in order to avoid taxation. The gold smuggling acts are likely to thrive as long as the import duty on gold remains high. Industry sources indicate that the high import duty on bullion has opened doors of malpractices. The government has not yet yielded to repeated requests for reduction of high gold duty structure. The seizures during 2015-’16 had totaled almost 3,000 kilograms of gold. DRI estimates indicate that smuggled gold worth nearly INR 91 crores have already been seized during the current financial year until mid-September.

Recently, DRI officials had arrested one passenger and two on-contract ground handling staff for attempting to smuggle around 1 kilogram of gold worth nearly INR 35 lakh at the Chennai International Airport. The passenger, who had arrived at the airport from Abudhabi, had handed over the bag containing gold to the ground staff, in order to smuggle it out of the airport. The DRI officials, who acted on a tip, apprehended the three accused for further questioning. An inquiry is being launched to find out whether gold was smuggled out of the airport in a similar fashion before. It must be noted that DRI had seized gold worth INR 1.06 crores hidden in the toilet of an aircraft that arrived from Bangkok during May 2016.

In another incident, the DRI officials had seized nearly 3.3 kilograms of gold worth around INR 92 lakhs from 14 passengers who arrived at the Thiruvananthapuram International Airport in South India by the same flight. The gold was found concealed in the rectum of passengers who reached the airport by Malindo Air flight from Kuala Lumpur. Detailed passport checks and body examination were carried out. Shortlisted passengers were taken to nearby hospital. Upon scanning, it was found that 14 passengers had hidden gold bars in various shapes in their rectum.

Meantime, latest Associated Chambers of Commerce of India (ASSOCHAM) data indicates that official gold imports by the country dropped sharply by nearly 59% year-on-year during Jan-Sep ’16 to 270 tons. It must be noted that the country had imported 658 tons of gold during the corresponding nine-month period in 2015.