Three brothers joined arms to conduct a gold smuggling business that spanned across Dhaka, Dubai, Masqat, Kuala Lumpur, Jeddah and cities in India. Their empire was built on the complicity of airport staff, cabin crew and even the cleaners.

Using encrypted messaging technology and far-sightedness and keeping their heads down, the trio conducted their business under the noses of law enforcers for years, while growing in size.

The information came to light when Detective Branch (DB) of Police arrested three members of a syndicate on Tuesday night.

The trio, arrested from the capital's Airport area, is Faruk Ahmed, 38, Meer Hossain, 28, and Md Shahin, 21. A team of DB officials found 80 gold bars weighing 9.33 kg in their possession. The DB officials also seized a car (Dhaka Metro Ga-22-1449) from them.

The estimated price of the gold seized is approximately Tk 4 crore, said Shaikh Nazmul Alam, deputy commissioner (north) of DB police.

On Tuesday, one of the siblings admitted to the investigators that for the last three years the syndicate have been smuggling in gold. The trio would smuggle in gold thrice a week by bribing some cabin crew, airport staffs and cleaner.

“Usually the syndicate members bring five to six kg in every shipment, meaning at least 15 kg a week,   from four countries,” said a DB investigator who interrogated the arrestees. To avoid detection, they would curtail their operations at times of heightened security vigilance, an official said wishing anonymity.

To dodge law enforcers, they used to communicate among them using “WeChat”, an online messaging application.

Faruk's elder brother, Masud Karim Rana, who is now on the run, looked after their local customers, mainly the gold businessmen while another brother, Rahmat Bari, was in-charge of smuggling gold to India, said the DB investigator. Rahmat is also absconding.

According to a database, Customs Intelligence and Investigation Directorate (CIID), customs officials and different other agencies seized over 2,000kg of gold in the last three years.

According to officials, there was no import of gold through LC (letter of credit) in the last three decades in Bangladesh.

Detectives and investigators suspect the seized gold made up only five percent of the total gold smuggled into Bangladesh during that period. A small portion fed the demand in the local market and the rest went to India, the world's second biggest consumer of gold after China.

A section of higher-ups -- political and government high-ups -- and some dishonest officials in the administration, law enforcement and intelligence agencies collude with around 30 gold smuggling syndicates, according to an intelligence agency report submitted to the Prime Minister's Office in 2015, jewellers and investigators.

THE SMUGGLER'S SET-UP

Exploring the method used by the smugglers, a culture of complicity, advanced planning and international involvement all surfaced.

Faruk told investigators that his brother Rana, while staying in Dubai four years ago for business purposes, met a gold smuggler and joined the racket.

Upon Rana's return home, he communicated with local syndicate members using the Dubai-based link and worked his way up to becoming the ring leader.

Investigators said he used to draw people to his syndicate from the pool of people who were released on bail.

He would then bring in the gold while helping other smugglers too by bribing the cabin crew of two airlines and airport staff, a service by which he brought in additional revenue.

One of the arrestee, Meer Hossain, was a staff of a catering centre of Regent Airways. The air hostess or cabin crew would give Meer the seat numbers where the gold would be kept hidden.

Meer would later carry the gold out by putting it inside a bin bag and keep it in the garbage truck.

For his job, Meer would get Tk 2,000 for each gold bar which meant he received Tk 1,60,000 for bringing out 80 gold bars from the airport.

The garbage truck driver, who reportedly got Tk 10,000 to Tk 20,000 for a single shipment, would meet the smugglers in a safe location near the airport and handover the gold to them, the DB official quoting Faruk, said.

Another arrestee, Shahin, was the car driver, who was hired for his ability to drive fast.

Detectives are now interrogating the three arrestees, who were placed on two day remand yesterday.

The latest consignment seized by the police has gold shipments for three to four smugglers which were smuggled in from Dubai last Tuesday by a Regent airlines flight.

The DB official said that Faruk told them that it was the third shipment of the gang this week. Earlier on October 21, they brought in 60 pieces of gold bars weighing around 7 kg and 45 gold bars weighing around 5 kg on October 22.

The gang mainly smuggled gold in the country from Dubai, Masqat, Kuala Lumpur and Jeddah.

Nazmul said that primarily they found the involvement of Nazrul Islam Liton, the ringleader who smuggled in 105 kilograms of gold worth around Tk 46 crore. DB police arrested Nazrul on June 2, 2014 but he reportedly secured bail two months after the arrest and fled from the country.

Besides Liton, DB police have so far got the names of 17 others involved in the gold smuggling racket.

According to First Information Report filed with Airport Police Station, these 17 were identified as Md Reza, who owned the seized private car, Murad, Manik and Amzad, cleaners of Biman Bangladesh Airlines, Mishu, a cabin crew of Regent Airways, Sakib Chowdhury, Masud Karim Rana and Rahmat Bari, gold smugglers and gold carriers Azmeer, Dinesh alias Dinaj, Reaj, Amjad, Rafiq, Mofiz, Ershad and Shaheen.

Mohorom Ali Masud, senior assistant commissioner of DB police, told The Daily Star that they have got some smugglers names from the arrestees and they are now checking their involvement.

Of the suspects, a number of them were arrested earlier but went back to their profession after securing bail, he said. “We are conducting drives to arrest the absconding criminals.”