Four arrested in diesel smuggling racket bust, fuel worth Rs 1 cr seized

Four persons were arrested by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) on Friday after a diesel smuggling racket got busted. Fuel worth Rs 1 crore was seized in the racket bust.

According to the press release by Additional Director General, DRI, Vivek Chaturvedi, four people were smuggling diesel declaring it as a ‘mineral spirit’ from Dubai into India via Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh and Chennai.

The press release stated, “Dummy companies were opened in Dubai to purchase diesel and import the same to Chennai by creating false documents and invoices. The price difference was being adjusted by payments through hawala channels. It is found that in the past these operators have smuggled around 5366 MT (63 lakh liters approx.) of diesel valued at around Rs 17.7 crore, which comes to around 285 containers.”

The DRI officers of Hyderabad and Chennai carried out search operations with the support of the Andhra Pradesh State Intelligence Department since April 17.

In the operations, two container freight stations in Chennai revealed that 14 containers which were goods declared as mineral spirit carried 263.78 MT (3 lakh liters approximate) of diesel.