Over the week, police arrested Balu Jaganath Dhange, 48, owner of Balaji and Son’s shop in New Road; Aakash Kumar Bajracharya, 53, of United Gold Mart; Naresh Agrawal, 52, of Maman Stores, Boudha and Ramesh Khadka, 38 of Sangam Jewellers, Kathmandu. Also arrested was Shiva Raj Shrestha,

39 of Morang.

The traders were arrested with more than 5 kg of raw gold, 56 kg of raw silver

and Rs 47.4 million, according to police.

Superintendent of Police Prakash Adhikari of crime division said they had deployed four police teams from February 4-6 to arrest these people and investigate the case. “So far we were able to arrest only the gold carriers. We will now work on busting the entire gold smuggling racket that includes traders and gold shops,” said Adhikari. “It is apparent

now that the bullion traders are themselves part of the smuggling.”

SP Adhikari said they have sent the arrestee to the Department of Revenue Investigation and Department of Money Laundering Investigation to conduct further probe into the issue.

Nepal’s border with the Chinese autonomous region of Tibet has been used as a major route for gold smuggling, police said, adding that most of the gold, originally from Hong Kong, enters Nepal through the Tatopani border crossing via Lhasa.

The market has also been receiving a sizeable amount of gold from returning Nepalis migrant workers. Nepalis are permitted to

carry 50 gram gold on their return from overseas. With remittance falling in the first quarter of the current

fiscal, the central bank suspects misuse of the cash in gold smuggling.