30 passengers detained for 'smuggling' flee Lucknow airport
Lucknow (PTI): Thirty people who were detained at the Lucknow airport for allegedly smuggling gold into the country escaped after one of them pretended to fall sick and created chaos, officials said.
Customs and police officials have launched a search operation to nab the accused, they said.
Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police Shashank Singh said officials of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence and the Customs Department on Monday stopped 36 passengers from Sharjah at the Chaudhary Charan Singh Airport here.
When the officials frisked them, cigarettes worth more than Rs 3 crore and cash worth Rs 23.90 lakh were seized from some of them, Singh said.
Six of the passengers told officials that they were carrying gold, he said.
On Tuesday, when the remaining 30 passengers were being questioned, one of them pretended to be ill and created chaos. Taking advantage of this, all of them fled, the officer said.
A case has been registered under relevant sections on the complaint in the matter and efforts are being made to arrest the accused, he added.
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Shivaji statue maker has links with RSS, alleges Congress leader Patole
Mumbai (PTI): Amid the political storm in Maharashtra over the collapse of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj's statue at Rajkot fort in Malvan, Congress leader Nana Patole on Thursday claimed that the sculptor who made it was close to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
The allegation drew a mocking reply from state cultural affairs minister Sudhir Mungantiwar who said he had "heard" that the artist was, in fact, close to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.
Speaking to reporters at the Nagpur airport, state Congress chief Patole said, "The artist Jaydeep Apte had no experience of making a statue of such a scale. Apte is associated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh."
Responding to the claim, Mungantiwar, a BJP leader, said, "Someone told me that the artist is close to Rahul Gandhi. Need to verify this information.....There seems to be a new habit of making wild allegations."
The 35-foot statue of the 17th-century founder of the Maratha empire collapsed on August 26, nearly nine months after Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled it.
Sindhudurg police has registered an FIR against Apte and structural engineer Chetan Patil in connection with the incident.
