The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) seized 12 kg of smuggled gold bars hidden in a zinc scrap container from Mundra port of Kutch district.
"An intelligence was developed by the zonal unit of the DRI which indicated an attempt to smuggle gold by resorting to concealment in a containerised cargo of zinc scrap being imported at Mundra port," a DRI official said.
"Based on specific intelligence, DRI officers seized a container imported from Dubai in the name of a Rajkot-based firm having declared goods as zinc scrap," the official said.
DRI officers separated 95 pieces of lumps of zinc scrap and identified 12 pieces as gold bars of one kg each.
Officers also claimed that each gold bar seized has 995 purity as well as marks of Emirates Gold and Gulf Gold refineries.
Gold bars were entirely covered with clay-sand particles to hide them in zinc scrap.
"The overseas supplier would first entirely cover gold bars by pasting wet clay-sand on each of them. Later, it would be kept in rectangular shaped cases between molten zinc and then would be sent to Rajkot-based agents as a lump of zinc scrap," an officer said.
Further investigation into the gold bars is on, though the DRI has refrained from naming the Rajkot-based firm which imported the consignment.
