The Hindu : New Delhi News : Tout menace continues at airport

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 02, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

Tout menace continues at airport

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, FEB. 1. The nuisance of touts continues to plague Indira Gandhi International Airport here in the absence of any organised mechanism to debar those caught for various offences from entering the premises. During this past January, 348 touts were caught but 315 of them were let off after mere imposition of fines by the Airport Manager and the traffic police while only 33 were actually booked by the police.

A senior official said that despite knowing that these touts not only tarnish the image of the country but also pose a major threat to incoming tourists and visitors, especially foreigners, the authorities do not take any strong action against them and just let them off with petty fines or challans.

As a result, the touts only get emboldened and return each time with the knowledge that their offence, even if detected would result in an average fine of even less than Rs 1,000. The past month saw 15 touts being fined a total of Rs 14,000 by the Airport Manager while 300 were challaned a sum of Rs 25,500 by the traffic police.

Meanwhile, the Central Industrial Security Force, which is in-charge of airport security, has during the month also detected two cases of arms and ammunition which were being carried in the hand baggage by the passengers. However, as in both these cases the passengers were inadvertently carrying ammunition in their baggage and were valid arms licence holders, they were released after proper verification.

A total of 210 unattended baggage, containing articles worth around Rs 21 lakhs, were also detected with by the CISF during the month. While 93 were restored to their owners, 115 were deposited with the Airport Manager and two with other agencies.

Like the problem of touts, the nuisance of loaders stealing articles from the baggage of passengers at the International Terminal was also checked by CISF personnel at the airport and two loaders -- employed by licensed private agencies working in the airport premises -- were caught red-handed while they were pilfering goods from the baggage of passengers. However, while both the accused were reported to the airport authority and the concerned agencies, they were let off following a simple remand and were not debarred from working in the airport premises, an official said.

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