The Flight Attendant Who Smuggled $500,000 in Cash on a Plane

The smuggling of black money through the airline industry

Young and pretty with a clear complexion (marks, pimples, and blemishes not acceptable) — that is the requirement for flight attendants who wish to work at one of India’s premier airlines, Jet Airways.

Devshi Kulshreshtha fit the bill. She was only 25 years old and was already a part of the Jet Airways cabin crew for international flights. However, she wasn’t the average flight attendant.

On January 10, 2018, Kulshreshtha was arrested for trying to smuggle nearly $500,000 in cash out of India. She was already on a flight bound to Hong Kong from India when a tip-off led to her arrest.

The authorities found wads of $100 bills wrapped up in aluminium foil in her belongings. Almost $500,000 in cash was found. There were 32 bundles of cash in her check-in luggage and 16 bundles in her hand luggage.

This is the story of how Kulshreshtha got caught up in a smuggling racket.

Hiding the Cash

Six months before her arrest, Kulshreshtha was working on an international flight bound to India. She met a business man, Amit Malhotra, who seemed to be impressed by her service and in-flight hospitality. The two exchanged numbers.

Later, Malhotra sent her a text asking to meet up in person. During the meeting, he explained that he needed her to carry some cash for his “business associates.” Kulshreshtha initially refused the offer but was finally convinced by Malhotra to help him out.

The plan was for her to wrap the bundles of cash in aluminium foil, put them in her bag and cover the cash with her makeup and clothes. Kulshreshtha would then pass off the wrapped cash as chocolates. Once she had arrived in Hong Kong, she would message Malhotra, and someone would arrive to pick up the cash from her.

As a test, she started off by wrapping small bundles of cash in the foil. Once this had passed through the X-ray machine without detection, she proceeded to wrap up large bundles of cash.

Kulshreshtha managed to evade the X-ray machines at the airport. The X-ray machines at the airport could not see through the aluminium foil. The wrapped packages would only be seen as a black mass. Only a manual check would be able to detect the cash but none of the airport security were suspicious enough to check her luggage.

For each trip that involved smuggling a bundle of cash, Kulshreshtha was paid about 1 lakh rupees (approximately $1400). As she started making multiple trips smuggling the cash, she requested that her pay increase.

In 5 months, Kulshreshtha managed to smuggle a total of $1.4 million in cash.

The End of the Smuggling Racket

The mastermind behind the plan was Malhotra. He had lied to Kulshreshtha that he was a business tycoon. Malhotra actually ran a smuggling and money laundering network.

Malhotra would collect money from bullion dealers in Delhi and then send it abroad through his smuggling racket. He is reported to have used other Jet Airways crew members in addition to Kulshreshtha as part of his smuggling racket.

The authorities ended up arresting both Malhotra and Kulshreshtha. However, at the time of the arrest, it was not clear whether Kulshreshtha was aware that Malhotra ran a smuggling racket. Her lawyer argued in court that she was duped and trapped by Malhotra and that she was unaware of the contents of the foil-wrapped packages that she had carried.

In the end, Kulshreshtha was let out on bail but she was fired as a flight attendant by Jet Airways.

The official statement by Jet Airways about the incident was:

Jet Airways has a strict code of conduct and zero tolerance towards any action of its employees that contravenes domestic or international laws of the countries in/to which it operates.

Money laundering still happens quite often in India where the detection and prevention of money laundering is a work in progress and needs improvement. Strong efforts have been made to criminalize the activity. However, it seems that there are always ways to get past the legal blocks.

Sources: Business Today, New Indian Express, Times of India, The Daily Mail

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