The National Investigating Agency court in Kochi remanded Swapna Suresh and Sandeep Nair, the main accused in the gold smuggling case busted by the customs officials at Thiruvananthapuram, remanded to three days by judge P Krishnakumar on Sunday.
The duo was arrested by the NIA team probing the case from Bangalore late Saturday evening. They were brought to Kochi by Sunday noon and were subjected to covid-19 test at Aluva, the result of which is expected by Monday.
Judge P Krishnakumar who heard the NIA ordered that Swapna and Sandeep be sent to coronavirus centers at Karukutti and Thrissur respectively. Once they test negative for Covid-19, the NIA team has been asked to produce them before the court.
The NIA asked the court to send them to custody for ten days. But the judge decided to send them to corona observation centre for three days and asked the agency to produce the accused in the court on Monday when the court would take a decision on the plea by the NIA.
Later, Swapna and Sandeep were sent to coronavirus observation centers.
The case got wide publicity because of the links the accused had with senior officials in the Chief Minister’s Office. M Sivasankar, Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister was shunted out following disclosures made by a section of the media that the former had close liaison with Swapna Suresh.
Swapna, who was holding an important position in one of the ventures launched by the Information Technology Department has since been dismissed from service. The gold smuggling case hogged limelight because of Swapna’s involvement in getting the consignment addressed to the UAE Consulate in Thiruvananthapuram released from the Customs officials at the Aircargo complex.
The Customs officials had raided the apartments of Swapna and Sivsankar at Thiruvananthapuram and reportedly seized incriminating documents. Following charges made by the Opposition parties that the CMO had a role in the gold smuggling, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan wrote to the Prime Minister asking for a comprehensive probe into the whole affair. The Centre promptly handed over the investigation to the elite NIA which took into custody Swapna and Suresh within hours.
Sarith, former PRO of the UAE Consulate has been held by the Customs officials last Monday itself. It was Sarith and Swapna who reportedly intervened for the Consulate in getting the consignment released. Sarith is the first accused in the case as per the FIR filed by the NIA.
The agency had listed Fazil Fareeth a Dubai based businessman as the third accused. The Customs had taken Ramees, a specialist in gold smuggling from Malappuram, who is being interrogated at Kochi.
The NIA in its FIR has stated that the proceeding from gold smuggling was redirected to anti-national and terrorist activities and has filed the same under the UAPA making it difficult for the accused to get bail.