An FIR has been registered against unidentified CISF personnel after an Australian woman alleged that her jewellery and foreign currencies worth Rs 50,000 were stolen from her handbag during an X-ray check when she was transferring from the international to the domestic section at Delhi airport.

Akeshni Singh Gour, 40, flew from Sydney to Delhi on an Air India flight and took a connecting flight of the airline to Hyderabad on August 11 when she met with the untoward incident. She was travelling to India to attend her father-in-law’s funeral.

“The whole thing was an act that involved a number of officials who knew what they were doing and they took advantage of my vulnerability of knowing a mother travelling alone with two very little children (aged 3 and 7) who were both exhausted from a 15-hour flight,” the FIR, registered on January 4, stated.

Speaking to PTI over the phone from her Sydney home, Gour said she realised the theft after she reached Hyderabad and she strongly suspected the involvement of security personnel because throughout the whole journey, the only time her backpack containing valuables was out of her sight was when she went through the screening.

“I wrote to every authority, starting from aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia to airport security, Delhi police, CISF, etc, in the last six months but it was only on December 30 that I received an email from the SHO of IGI Airport (in Delhi) to join the investigation,” Gour said.

The office of Apoorv Pandey, public relations officer of the CISF, said they were looking into the matter. Gour said: “On October 11, 2022, I received an email from Arun Singh, AIG airport security, who asked me to pursue the matter with the local police.”

Gour said that during the X-ray screening, she took five trays — three for her backpacks, one for a suitcase and one additional tray for her laptop. Together with her children, she walked out through the screening process on the other side.

“All trays but the one with the backpack with my personal belongings came out together. I picked up all the stuff and later saw the one tray with the backpack going onto the other side where those bags with questionable items go,” she said.

“I walked to the other side and the officer asked me for my boarding pass and I said the boarding pass is in that bag itself. He then asked me to take that out, which I did as it was sitting right on top,” she added.

Her suspicion was not raised when the officer looked at the X-ray screen and asked her to go. She, however, found it surprising that he didn’t even check the bag.

“If they found some questionable items, why didn’t they check it then? They asked me rather to hurry up and go without any inspection,” she said.