The Hindu : Four held for cheating tourist

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Mar 14, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Four held for cheating tourist

By Devesh K. Pandey

NEW DELHI, MARCH 13. A 25-year-old Japanese national who had flown in from Tokyo to the Capital this past Thursday was allegedly cheated of 200 U.S. dollars and some Indian currency by a tourist information centre's owner in connivance with three other men. The Lajpat Nagar police have arrested four persons in this connection and recovered the extorted amount.

According to sources, the Japanese tourist, Mai Kusuma, had landed at the Indira Gandhi International Airport around 5-30 p.m. on Thursday. At the airport, she booked a pre-paid taxi for the New Delhi area to find a hotel for stay. She asked the driver to take her to a tourist agency that would guide her to some hotel.

The driver took her to a tourist agency named Tourist Info at Old Rajender Nagar. He introduced her to the agency owner, Feroze, who apparently made some calls to his contacts to find out the status of vacancies in hotels after which he told Mai Kusuma that all the hotels were full. To convince her, he also made his contacts talk to her. While she was contemplating what to do next, Feroze offered her to stay in his B-Block Lajpat Nagar house for the time being.

A hesitant Mai Kusuma agreed after which Feroze took her to his house, where he lives with his wife, sons and parents. In the name of providing her accommodation and taxi service, Feroze allegedly extorted all the money she had -- in U.S. dollars and Indian currency. Getting an opportunity, Mai Kusuma fled from Feroze's house the next morning and somehow reached New Delhi railway station where she contacted the police and narrated the whole incident to them.

The case was transferred to the Lajpat Nagar police and investigated under the direct supervision of the area Deputy Commissioner of Police. Since the victim had already misplaced the pre-paid slip, the police took her to the airport's Indian Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC) booth to trace the taxi that had ferried her to the Old Rajender Nagar tourist agency. While scanning the records, the police noticed that a taxi driven by one Satish, a resident of Najafgarh in South-West Delhi, had been sent to New Delhi.

Subsequently, Satish was rounded up for questioning. After his admission that he had taken Mai Kusuma to Old Rajender Nagar, Satish led the police to the tourist agency office from where Feroze was arrested. His father, Mohammad Ali, was also arrested for his alleged involvement. During interrogation, Feroze disclosed that in order to trap the victim he had made her talk to his accomplices, convincing her that all the hotels in the area were full. At his instance, the police arrested one of his accomplice, Shehnawaz, and Satish, who did the job for a commission.

The police have secured Feroze's remand and recovered the money he had extracted from the victim. He is being interrogated to find out whether he had been running some kind of organised gang to cheat foreign tourists.

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