Nepal police seize 35 kg smuggled gold on way to India

In the biggest ever seizure of gold in Nepal, police today seized 35 kg of the yellow metal worth USD 2 million imported illegally from China and on way to India, where its demand was soaring.
The gold was seized in 35 tablets of one kilogramme each from a container which arrived in Kathmandu from Khasha (in China) through Tatopani border, said Prakash Aryal, Director of the CBI and Deputy Inspector General of Police.
Police arrested four people in connection with the case.
The consignment, worth nearly USD 2 million in the local market, was the biggest ever seizure made by the Nepal Police in recent time, according to Senior Superintendent of Police Uttam Kumar Karki at the Central Bureau of Investigation.

The container, in which the large cache of gold was hidden, was taken under control from Koteshwor in the eastern part of Kathmandu following a tip off, the police said.
Truck driver Nima Tshering Tamangm and Om Bahadur Bajracharya, who was involved in transporting the gold consignment, have been arrested.

The police have also arrested owners of the consignment Gyamjo Lama, 57, hailing from Kathmandu and Mohan Kumar Agrawal, 47, from Dharan Municipality.
"The police had followed the vehicle from the Tibetan border for several hours and seized the gold which was hidden inside a container," said SSP Karki.
"This is for the first time that we have arrested the owners of the smuggled gold," the senior police officer said.

India, the world's largest consumer of gold, has hiked import duty on the precious metal three times within a year to curb its soaring demand and bridge trade deficit and current account deficit.
Finance Minister P Chidambaram had appealed to people not to buy gold and instead invest in financial instruments.