STF nabs 3 with 10 gold bars, $30,000 in cash

Kolkata: The Special Task Force (STF) of Kolkata Police has nabbed three persons with 10 gold bars and 30,000 US dollars in cash from Sinthee area on Wednesday afternoon.

According to police, on Wednesday morning STF officials came to know that a few persons would come to the Sinthee area to hand over gold bars. Based on the information, STF personnel started keeping a strict vigil in and around a specific area on South Sinthee Road.

After a few hours, police spotted three men acting suspiciously and two of them were seen handing over a bag to another man. Police personnel soon surrounded them and asked them to show their bag.

Initially, the trio identified as Susanta Dhar, Niranjan Chakraborty and Saju Mahaldar tried to confront the STF personnel, but later police detained them and took them to Sinthee police station.

There cops searched the bag and found 10 gold bars weighing about 1.14 kg, which is worth approximately Rs 41 lakh. From one of the accused persons, cops also found 30,000 US dollars worth approximately Rs 21 lakh.

During interrogation, the accused persons disclosed that the gold was brought illegally from Bangladesh by road. But how they had got such a huge amount of US dollars is yet to be found.

It is suspected that Mahaldar and Chakraborty were the carriers of gold. Police are trying to find out the kingpin of the smuggling racket.

STF had earlier arrested several persons with gold bars, which were also smuggled in from Bangladesh.