The Excise Department has seized cash worth Rs 1.2 crore from a passenger traveling in a Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) bus at Menangadi here. This cash is suspected to be linked to Hawala.
The department gave this information on Sunday. Excise officials said the bus was searched as part of an anti-narcotics operation and the cash was recovered from a passenger named Ammatur Abdul Razzaq, a resident of Malappuram.
An official said that Razzaq was traveling in a bus from Bengaluru to Kozhikode. He said that the excise officials checked the luggage of the passengers traveling in the bus.
“During the search, the officers found a bag containing cash worth Rs 1.2 crore,” an official said. He said that during interrogation, Razzaq claimed that the bag was given to him by an unknown person to give to another person in Kozhikode.
“Razzaq claimed that he had no information about the person who gave the bag and the person to whom it was to be delivered,” the officer said. Excise officials suspect that Razzaq was working as a courier for the hawala network operating between Kerala and Karnataka. The department said the accused and the seized money will be handed over to the police or Income Tax Department for further investigation.