Ahmedabad Customs officials on October 27 seized 495.04 grams of 24-carat gold worth Rs 72,28,574 — about Rs 72.28 lakh — from a passenger who arrived on an Air Arabia flight from Sharjah at Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, after finding gold paste concealed inside his trolley bag, according to Customs.

Source: Nation Press

The Air Intelligence Unit flagged the passenger through profiling of arrivals on Air Arabia flight G9-418 from Sharjah. An anomalous X-ray image of the checked-in baggage prompted a detailed physical examination, during which officers peeled back an inner plastic lining of the trolley bag and found gold paste spread uniformly beneath a thin black plastic sheet. The material was extracted and melted down, confirming 495.04 grams of 24-carat gold.

The gold was seized and the passenger was arrested under the Customs Act, 1962, officials said, adding that further investigation by Ahmedabad Customs is under way.

Source: IANS

According to the report, this was the third significant gold seizure at the airport in October 2026, following earlier trolley-bag concealment cases on October 19 (Rs 20.12 lakh, from a Dubai arrival) and October 16 (Rs 42.5 lakh, from an Abu Dhabi arrival). Separately, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence announced on October 19 that it had busted an alleged gold smuggling syndicate operating through Ahmedabad and Surat airports, seizing 13.017 kg of gold worth Rs 19.41 crore and arresting three people; investigators have not publicly confirmed a direct link between that syndicate case and the individual passenger seizures.