Chennai, May 10 (PTI) The Air Customs here on Monday claimed to have busted a new modus operandi vis-a-vis gold- smuggling, with officials recovering the yellow metal concealed as granules in instant drink mix.

The seizure was made from the Foreign Post Office (FPO) here based on intelligence that smugglers may resort to smuggling of gold in postal mode.

Accordingly, a postal parcel, which arrived from Dubai a few days ago, was intercepted at FPO on suspicion of containing gold, an official release here said.

The parcel was declared to contain seeds and addressed to a city-based person, but when it was cut open, officials discovered four big containers of an instant drink mix that they found unusually heavy.

"On opening, the containers were found to be having original aluminium foil lids. On cut opening the lids, gold granules mixed with orange powder were found in the containers. The gold granules were then segregated from the orange powder mix by using a sieve," the release said.

A total of 2.5 kg of gold granules valued at Rs 1.20 crore were recovered. Searches were carried out and it was found that the address of the receiver has been misused, it said.

"The role of the postal staff is being investigated," it added.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)