A Kenyan was arrested in an Indian airport after he was caught smuggling gold worth Ksh54 million to the South Asian country using an ailing four-month-old baby.
The Kenyan was identified as a medical professional who had travelled from Nairobi on March 6, headed to the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA).
He was accompanying parents who were taking their sick child to India for cardiac surgery.
Customs officials intercepted the man on the basis of Application Programming Interface (APIS) profiling and discreetly followed him.
While at the airport, he was carrying a portable oxygen concentrator to help the baby, who suffers from heart disease, to breathe.
Customs officials conducted a search on the medic and that was when they found the smuggled gold.
“On a search, taking due care for the safety of the infant, 7 bars of gold weighing 7 kilograms were ingeniously concealed in the oxygen concentrator bag were recovered,” India Customs officials revealed in a statement.
The Kenyan was immediately arrested and the Indian security agencies launched investigations into the incident immediately.
According to the current gold market price, the bars were estimated to be worth Ksh54 million.
Gold scams have been rampant in Kenya with security agencies fouling schemes by fake gold dealers.
On February 4, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) rescued an Indian national who was about to be conned Ksh25 million over a fake gold deal.
During the rescue operation, DCI arrested 8 Kenyans and two foreign nationals who had earlier defrauded an American citizen of Ksh67 million over a fake gold deal.
It was later revealed that two of the eight arrested Kenyans were high-profile politicians.
