Two Bangladeshi citizens held with gold consignment from near Bengal border

Kolkata, Jan 8 (IANS) Two Bangladeshi citizens with huge consignments of gold biscuits have been arrested by the BSF personnel from near the Benapole-Petrapole border in North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal, officials informed on Sunday.

Working on a tip-ff that a huge consignment of gold was being smuggled through a bus, the BSF jawans of the 145 battalion stopped the vehicle, that was coming to Kolkata from Agartala via Dhaka, near the border checkpoint.

After thorough checking of the bus, 30 gold biscuits were recovered from the possession of driver, Mohammad Farhad and conductor Umar Farooq. Both of them have been identified as Bangladeshi nationals. The weight of the 30 gold biscuits was over three kilograms and its estimated market value in Indian currency is around Rs 2 crore.

During the interrogation, the arrested duo informed that this gold consignment was meant for someone in the New Market area in central Kolkata. They also admitted that they had been acting as handlers in this cross-border gold consignment smuggling for quite some time.

They informed that the name of the recipient of the consignment in the New Market area was one Mohammad Jamal, who was again supposed to take that consignment to Mumbai.