Kerala gold smuggling case: NIA raids six locations, 10 arrested so far

The National Investigative Agency (NIA) arrested six more people in the Kerala gold smuggling case, an official said Sunday.

The agency on Sunday raised six locations, including the houses of the arrested defendants, and confiscated hard drives, a computer, eight mobile phones, six SIM cards, and various bank documents, an NIA official told the news agency. PTI.

With the latest arrests, 10 people have been detained in connection with the case, where gold was smuggled through diplomatic baggage addressed to the UAE consulate in Thiruvananthapuram.

On July 30, two men, Jalal A M from Ernakulam and Said Alavi E from Malappuram, were arrested for conspiring with another arrested defendant, Ramees KT, the NIA spokesman said. On July 31, two more defendants, Mohammed Shafi P, and Abdu P T, both residents of Malappuram, were arrested.

On August 1, the NIA arrested two people, the residents of Ernakulam, Muhammad Ali Ebrahim and Muhammad Ali, after the investigation revealed that they were part of the conspiracy, in addition to helping and assisting Jalal AM to collect gold from smuggling Ramees KT into Thiruvananthapuram and distributing the smuggling among other conspirators, the NIA official said.

Muhammad Ali is a member of the People’s Front of India and was previously charged by the Kerala police in the case of a teacher palm cut in 2010. He was acquitted in 2015.

The NIA took over the investigation of the case on July 10. Customs had seized over 30 kg of gold, worth around Rs 15 million, at Thiruvananthapuram airport on July 5.

The case had touched the office of Kerala’s Chief Minister, Pinarayi Vijayan after it was discovered that its Chief Secretary and TI Secretary of State, IAS M Sivasankar officer, had ties to a key defendant, Swapna Suresh.

Sivasankar was interrogated for nine hours by the NIA on Monday.