What Makes India a Hotspot for Smuggled African Gold
Considered a symbol of wealth and class, gold is ingrained in India’s tradition spanning religions and communities. Photo courtesy Sam Panthaky/AFP It was too much rain for March. The roads in Lucknow, the capital city of the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, had become slippery. *Brijesh Dubey, a deputy director at the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), India’s top intelligence body dealing with evasion of customs duty and smuggling, got a lead on a gold smuggler. DRI had been tracking this man for a long time. The suspect had made some security investments and had also been involved in hawala transactions. That day he planned to run away with his stash of smuggled gold. “Heavy rain made it difficult for us to identify the vehicle,” Dubey told VICE News. “When we marked the vehicle and tried to intercept the guy, a mob gathered around us. They used tires and boulders to block our way. Because of reduced visibility, they could not do much.”Dubey’s team succeeded in nabbing all five people in the car, as well as the contraband. Gold from both neighbouring and African countries has poured into India for years through illicit channels. India seized smuggled gold, worth INR 49.5 crore (around 6.7 million USD) this year. Over a quarter of India’s gold sector is tainted with gold from questionable sources, according to an analysis by IMPACT, a Canada-based non-profit. A miner carries a load of ore at a farm owned by Grace Mugabe, wife of former Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, in Zimbabwe on April 5, 2018. According to local media, illegal gold miners in Zimbabwe seized the farm belonging to former first lady, four months after former President Robert Mugabe was ousted from power. Photo courtesy Jekesai Njikizana/AFP Zimbabwe, one of the origin countries, is losing an…