SHANGUMUGHAM: The Trivandrum airport is slowly turning out to be the favorite transit route for gold smuggling. Most of these illegal deeds happen with the tacit help of airport staff. The customs recently dodged a plan by cleaning members to get one kilogram worth of gold out from the plane. The officials received a hint about the fraud planned by the staff members. Till now, customs found a total of 100 kg of gold on several occasions, sometimes in airport baggage or seen abandoned inside the flight. But according to central agencies, almost five times the gold seized might have found its way out of the airport through the cleaning staff.

Earlier, many cleaning staff including customs officers were caught assisting in the smuggling run. The 13 kg of gold that evaded the eyes of the customs resulted in a gang fight in pettah. The gangs were caught by the police which created unrest among the forces calling into question the credibility of the security at the airport. Another 13 kg of gold was found in the waste bin of the toilet inside the plane.

Most of the airport staff are working on a contract basis. The cleaning staffs are recruited through agencies. Their mere salary makes them prone to fall into the prized offerings of such gangs to assist in smuggling.