2 held with iridium worth Rs1crore

On Friday, Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) officers arrested two persons including a businessman, for allegedly smuggling 5000 gms of iridium worth Rs1 crore into India by concealing it in SMD rework stations.

“Ravinder Singh and Bhupinder Singh, both residents of Delhi, were arrested by the DRI and subsequently remanded to judicial custody till October 7 by the holiday court on Saturday.” said a DRI officer.

However, defence lawyer Ravi Hirani said, “My clients were not aware of content of precious metal in their bags and they have been falsely implicated in the case by the department.”

DRI officers at Sahar airport checked the duo’s bags and found three SMD rework stations of foreign origin along with a screw driver, plier and T-shaped nut opener. They opened the rework stations and found five plastic bottles containing a grey-coloured chemical purported to be iridium.

During interrogation, Bhupinder Singh stated that he worked as a salesman with a Delhi-based company called Sato India owned by Kanwal Preet Singh. He said the SMD rework stations were given to him by his employer for delivery to a dealer in Mumbai. He claimed Ravinder Singh was his uncle.

However, Ravinder Singh revealed that he had no connection with Bhuninder Singh. He claimed that he owned Gold Manner Overseas and Gold Manner Impex Pvt. Ltd in Delhi. However, he was unable to give any reason for coming to Mumbai and accompanying Bhupinder Singh, the officer added.