In the biggest seizure in recent times, Air Intelligence Unit of Chennai Customs apprehended Rs 68 lakh worth of memory cards numbering 62,400 from two Delhi-based passengers Ashok Rattan (56) and Pooja Talwar (30) after they reached Chennai from Bangkok in a Thai Airways flight on Tuesday midnight. The two passengers have been arrested.
The passengers were found carrying the 2GB memory cards stuck to their legs and covered with stockings inside their dress.
“This is first such instance where two passengers were caught carrying memory cards in this fashion. Normally gold and more precious things would be carried stuck to the body,” said a customs official.
The official also said that a tip-off from the intelligence unit about a lady passenger carrying smuggled goods and travelling from Hong Kong via Bangkok through Chennai to reach Delhi helped his department nab the passengers.
“The memory cards will not be detected in the scanning machines and so we were able to catch them only by checking their ticket sequence,” he said.
According to market sources, the open market value of the seized memory cards could even be more than Rs 1 crore.
Airport sources said Mr Rattan, who runs a textile business and Ms Talwar, who is his personal secretary have taken to this illegal route of smuggling in memory cards after he began experiencing losses in his business.
