Md Joynal Abedin Khan :
Tourists from home and abroad are reportedly in fear of sudden attack, snatchings and robberies by miscreants during their trips to different sight seeing spots in the country.
They sought more security support at their residential hotels, motels, and other moving places like sight seeing spots from the law enforcers, mainly the ‘Tourist Police’.
According to sightseers, ‘Tourist Police’ is undoubtedly a great initiative by Bangladesh Police. Currently, they are working to ensure better and safe tourism in the country. But the force is now running with an inadequate manpower which needs to be increased to ensure safety for the travelers.
Meanwhile, this initiative has attained widespread appreciation not only from the tourists but also from various tour facilitation service providers.
Tourist police and some organizations, which work for the sightseeing visitors, have claimed that the government should remove the acute shortage of manpower of tourist police and improve their logistic support.
This security force is working for the tourists across the country with the shortage of at least 30 per cent manpower and 40 per cent logistic support, concerned sources said.
In this context, the government has undertaken a plan to increase the manpower of the newly introduced tourist police for ensuring visitors’ security, especially foreigners, as per the demand, they said.
Tanzim Ahmed, a Bangladeshi born British citizen, said that a gang of local miscreants snatched his bag at Saint Martin in Cox’s Bazar in March this year.
“We are in fear of sudden attack, snatching and robberies during visit to Bangladesh,” he said.
Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Tourist Police Md Sohrab Hossain told The New Nation on Monday that manpower of tourist police would be doubled from the existing 699 soon for bringing more tourist spots under security blankets.
The Finance Ministry has already approved the proposal and it will take some more time to get the final approval from the Prime Minister, the DIG said.
“Tourist police, a distinctly new unit has been instituted in Bangladesh Police with the objective of helping development of the tourism industry by fascination of the foreign and local tourists, improving ecological environment and preserving the culture and heritage of Bangladesh, a reverie country, adorned with incomparable bounties and immense exquisite natural beauties and thereby expediting the pace of its overall development,” the police official said.
One of the foremost objectives of the force is to improve the image of Bangladesh as a country of peace-loving people to the outside world, and help develop the tourism industry to the fullness of each potentiality, he added.
The government has introduced Tourist Police, a new unit of police to ensure security of tourists and protect the country’s tourism sites in August, 2009. The unit is tasked with the responsibilities of providing security to the tourist and protecting all the tourist spots of the country. The unit has two divisions headed by a DIG as its Chief. Two divisions are one in Chittagong and other in Dhaka. The areas falls under Chittagong division are Chittagong, Hill tracts and Cox’s Bazar. Dhaka, Sylhet and Kuakata come under Dhaka division.
A division each again divided into three zones. Each division is placed under the service of an Add. DIG, whereas a zone is under an Add. SP. Beside this the unit has 4 SPs, 8 Additional SPs, 11 ASPs and 21 Inspectors. The sanctioned strength of manpower of the unit is 699 in total. In an effort to ease the travels of tourists in the country, Tourist Police have unveiled a new Android app designed to make contacting tourism authorities and requesting help as simple as two taps on smartphone.
Additnal DIG of Dhaka Fazur Rahman said that we have lack of manpower and logistic support.
“If we noticed that miscreants attacked or targeted a tourist team or any person than we detained them and handed them over to local police as we have no authorized power to file a case,” Fazlur Rahman said. We are providing security to the tourists at their hotels, and ways to Hatirjheel, National Zoo and National Botanical Garden at Mirpur, Fantasy Kingdom and Nandan Park at Ashulia, Ahsan Monjil and Lalbag Fort at Old Dhaka, National Museum at Shabagh and Sonargaon Museum in Narayanganj, and Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Safari Park in Gazipur, the police official said.
According Bangladesh Tourism Board, around six lakh foreigners and more than 60 lakh national travelers visited around 800 sight seeing spots across the country in 2016. Of them, more than 15 lakh tourists visited at Cox’s Bazar sea beach.
Contacted, Shahid Hamid, Chairman of PATA Bangladesh Chapter, one of the largest tourist companies of the country, told The New Nation on Monday night, “The tourist need more safely at hotels and spots.”
The tourist police are providing the security service to tourists as per their level best, the PATA chairman said.
He proposed the government to spread the working jurisdiction across the country.
