Telangana: Hotels near RGIA den for drug traffickers?

HYDERABAD: Hotels in and around Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Shamshabad have come under the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence and Cyberabad police radar as mules involved in drug trafficking and gold smuggling are using these hotels as transit hubs.
In recent instances of heroin trafficking and gold smuggling, the DRI has found that smugglers pick up the package from mules staying in the hotels in Shamshabad and send it to onward destinations.On June 5, DRI sleuths seized 12 kg of heroin worth Rs 78 crore and two women passengers from Uganda and Zambia acted as mules.
The sleuths arrested the Ugandan when she came to collect her missing baggage at RGIA. The accused came to Hyderabad from Zimbabwe via Johannesburg and Doha and stayed in a Shamshabad hotel. She did not take her luggage initially and waited for a few days.
A DRI official said: “The woman was staying in the hotel and was supposed to return to the hotel after collecting the baggage and hand it over to her handler. We have seen similar instances in gold smuggling. Though the gold is destined for other cities, the mules land in Hyderabad.” He said the handler also stays in the same hotel in Shamshabad where the mules stay. “They arrive from Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi and other metros to Hyderabad and pick up the smuggled gold from the hotel and leave the place,” he said.
The hotels are now under the surveillance of RGIA police and the DRI.
Shamshabad deputy commissioner of police N Prakash Reddy told TOI, “When a foreigner arrives at a hotel, the staff take his or her details and uploads them in FRRO website for registration. The hotel staff will have to maintain a register of guests checking in. Our patrolling staff regularly visit the hotels and check the guest lists. If there is any suspicion, we taken action. The DRI and other enforcement agencies are looking into both smuggling and trafficking cases.”