Demonetisation effect: Over Rs 5 crore cash, gold seized at airports

Over Rs 5 crore of cash and gold have been intercepted by agencies at country's few major civil airports post the demonetisation of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes by the government last week.

Officials said a special surveillance was launched by the CISF and the air intelligence units of the Income Tax department and the interceptions have been made at Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Guwahati airports from November 10.

"The total cash and gold intercepted since November 10 is about Rs 5 crore. While the currency is all in the scrapped denomination of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000, the gold detected as suspicious is about 15.62 kilogramme," they said.

They added that while the interceptions were largely made by the officials of the Central Industrial Security Force, the cases were later handed over to the I-T department for further investigations.

"These figures and instances are under investigation and we are looking if there is a tax evasion angle to it," a senior tax department official said.

The Finance Ministry had recently written to police and paramilitary forces to check the movement of huge cash, particularly of the demonetised 500 and 1,000 rupee notes at civil airports, Delhi Metro, railway stations and bus stations and hence the special vigil has been launched.

The CISF, tasked with security of 59 civil airports and Delhi Metro, has also enhanced vigil after the Finance Ministry directive.