Agartala, January 8, 2020 (IANS): Border Security Force (BSF) troopers led by senior officials on Wednesday arrested three people of a family who were smuggling gold valued around Rs one crore from Bangladesh, BSF official said.
Acting on a tip-off, the BSF jawans led by senior officials apprehend one Jahangir Hossain, 54, his wife and son while they were clandestinely acquiring 2.276 kg gold worth of Rs 96 lakh from the Bangladeshi smugglers.
“The Indian smuggler Jahangir Hossain, while doing the illegal trade was assisted by his wife and young son. The three were detained at the spot bordering Jaynagar (on the outskirts of the state capital here) in Agartala,” BSF Deputy Inspector General (DIG) C.L. Belwa told IANS over the phone from the India-Bangladesh border.
He said that Customs officials were informed who later reached the border village. The gold was handed over to the Customs Department for completing their formalities.
On January 3, the BSF and the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence had seized around 1,68,500 Yaba tablets (drugs) worth of Rs 8.53 crore destined for Bangladesh from a house in a border village called Matinagar-Rayermura under the Sepahijala district in western Tripura.
Tripura shares a 856-km international border with Bangladesh, of which a stretch of 67 km is still unfenced.
Mountainous terrain, dense forests and other hindrances have made most parts of this border porous, enabling smugglers, illegal immigrants and intruders to cross over with little hindrance.
According to the BSF and intelligence officials, the Yaba tablets and various other drugs including heroin and brown sugar are smuggling into northeastern states from neighbouring Myanmar and smuggle to Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and different Indian states and other adjoining countries.
The police chiefs of eight northeastern states last month have decided to intensify their efforts to curb the drug menace as the region, bordering China, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Bhutan, have turned into a corridor for drug smuggling.
