NEW DELHI: India has become a hot favourite for international gold smuggling syndicates which are also draining the country of its scarce foreign currency reserves, adversely impacting the dollar-rupee rate. The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) busted one such gang on Wednesday and arrested five Taiwanese nationals, including two women, at Indira Gandhi International airport and seized half a million US dollars from their checked-in baggage.

In the last three years, the agency has seized close to 10 tons of the yellow metal worth around Rs 4,000 crore (at current prices) and more than Rs 300 crore in foreign currencies. Along with the huge seizures, the agency arrested around 4,000 persons that included 480 foreign nationals, at least a quarter of them of Chinese origin.

The seizures of gold and foreign currencies are less than 10% of the actual smuggling, say, senior officers, a majority of the smuggled gold find their place in the local bullion market and with those engaged in largescale

. The spurt in gold smuggling is also due to a clampdown by the government on Benami properties in the real estate sector and the recent increase in Customs duty on gold.

“International gold smuggling syndicates are bullish on India as it provides a high rate of return of more than 15% -- smuggling gold into India from

Dubai

and

and taking out the sale proceed through foreign currencies by

or in personal baggage of carriers,” a source said.

Last year, the DRI had arrested 1,530 persons, which included 210 foreign nationals caught in the seizure of more than 4 tons of gold worth over Rs 1,600 crore and 35 foreigners arrested with Rs 164 crore worth of foreign currencies.

The five Taiwanese nationals arrested on Wednesday revealed that they had arrived at New Delhi from Hong Kong on Sunday and were booked on a return flight on Wednesday with the illegal foreign currency consignment. “They also confessed that they were part of a larger syndicate involved in smuggling of foreign origin gold into India and smuggling out the sale proceeds in foreign currency,” the agency said.

According to sources, thousands of crores worth of foreign currencies have been smuggled out of the country in the last few years, making an adverse impact on dollar-rupee exchange rate. Foreign nationals from China, Singapore, Taiwan,

, Africa, Afghanistan,

, Bhutan and

are among those arrested, though a quarter of them was from China. The international syndicates have made deep inroads across the country, using Bhutan and Mayanmar as transit routes.