UAE consular attache leaves India as gold smuggling probe gains steam

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Thiruvananthapuram: Rashid Al Salami, an attache with the UAE Consulate in Thiruvananthapuram, to whom the smuggled gold seized a week ago was addressed, reportedly left India.

The attache of the UAE Consulate General left for Dubai via New Delhi three days ago, according to media reports.

The Customs had seized 30kg gold worth Rs 14.8 crore from a diplomatic baggage addressed to the attache from the Trivandrum International Airport on July 5.

The Customs detained the baggage from Dubai on June 30 on suspicion of smuggling.

Swapna Suresh, consultant in the Space Park project under the Kerala State Information Technology Infrastructure Limited (KSITIL), called up the assistant commissioner of Customs claiming to be the secretary of the consul general of the UAE consulate in Thiruvananthapuram, and demanded the baggage be released.

The department then directed the consulate official to whom the baggage is addressed to come personally to collect it. When Customs refused to release it, former PRO of the consulate P S Sarith Kumar went to its office with a man attired in Arabic costume and allegedly threatened the officials there.

The cargo was opened on July 5 and the smuggled gold was found upon inspection leading to Sarith’s arrest. Swapna went into hiding along with Sandeep Nair, who was allegedly involved in the case. They were later arrested from Bengaluru.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA), which has been entrusted with the probe into the case has booked four accused – Sarith, Swapna Suresh, Sandeep Nair and Fasil Fareed under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

During the probe, it was revealed that 16 phone calls were made between the attache and Swapna on July 3 when the diplomatic cargo with gold reached the Consulate. Fourteen of these calls were made by the attache to Swapna.

The case stirred a political controversy as the name of M Sivasankar, a top bureaucrat emerged for having connections with Swapna. Sivasankar was removed from the posts of state IT secretary and principal secretary to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan following this.