Two people were stopped by customs officials at Delhi airport for suspected gold smuggling. One of them claimed to work as a personal assistant to Shashi Tharoor, a Congress leader. The incident involved about 500 grams of gold. Reacting to this, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, a union minister, accused the Congress and the Communist Party of being involved in gold smuggling. The person who claimed association with the Congress MP was named Shiv Kumar Prasad.
Shashi Tharoor is currently contesting in the Lok Sabha elections from the Thiruvananthapuram constituency. His opponent from the BJP is Rajeev Chandrasekhar. Shiv Kumar Prasad was arrested at the Delhi Airport while receiving a passenger from Dubai. Both were caught when the passenger tried to hand over around 500 grams of gold to Prasad.
Customs authorities mentioned that Prasad had a permit card allowing him access to the airport. He was detained along with the passenger upon receiving the gold packet. The authorities seized 500 grams of gold from them. The case is now under investigation, and their backgrounds are being checked.
In 2020, Kerala faced a gold scam after Customs seized 30 kilograms of gold at Thiruvananthapuram Airport from a diplomatic bag. The investigation was taken over by the NIA. M Sivasankar, the principal secretary to Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan, was suspended from his post due to allegations of his involvement with one of the accused.
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