July 16, 2023 A viral video purportedly showed a tourist scurrying for cover inside a petha shop on Fatehabad road in Agra, saving himself from baton-wielding goons. The tourist left the city without lodging a formal complaint. But the Tajganj police took note of the incident, after which five of the eight named accused were arrested.
Oct 22, 2017, a Swiss couple – Quentin Jeremy Clerc and his girlfriend Marie Droz (both 24) – was chased by a group of local boys, and hit with sticks and stones. While Clerc suffered skull fracture and nerve damage, Droz was left nursing a number of broken bones. All five accused, including three juveniles, were arrested. AGRA : Almost six years after the attack on the Swiss couple, memories of the horrific incident came back to haunt Agra recently when an unidentified tourist, probably from Delhi, was chased and assaulted by 8 to 10 baton-wielding goons after his car touched one of them. But at the receiving end was the reputation of the city of Taj as a tourist destination.
On July 11, a rickshaw puller, few shopkeepers and a handloom centre owner were booked for allegedly duping tourists from Ajmer who came to visit the Taj Mahal. The family was asked to pay a higher price for a fake brand of ‘petha’. The rickshaw puller had taken the tourists to a shop claimed to be a government owned one, but it was not so, and they were made to pay higher than the actual price, said in-charge of tourist police station Reena Chaudhary. A case was registered at the Tourist Police Station under IPC sections 420, 504 and 506.
{{/usCountry}}On July 11, a rickshaw puller, few shopkeepers and a handloom centre owner were booked for allegedly duping tourists from Ajmer who came to visit the Taj Mahal. The family was asked to pay a higher price for a fake brand of ‘petha’. The rickshaw puller had taken the tourists to a shop claimed to be a government owned one, but it was not so, and they were made to pay higher than the actual price, said in-charge of tourist police station Reena Chaudhary. A case was registered at the Tourist Police Station under IPC sections 420, 504 and 506.
{{/usCountry}}On January 29, three persons were booked for allegedly fleecing a Swiss woman visiting the Taj Mahal. The trio — an emporium owner, a salesman and a guide — were charged under Section 420 (cheating) of the IPC by the tourist police in Agra.
Complainant Isa Bell, a Swiss woman in her thirties, was taken to the Taj Mahal by a guide Furqan Ali, who then took her to a nearby emporium where she was asked to pay ₹80,000 for a chessboard, a box and other items. After bargaining, the combined price of all the items was reduced to ₹37,500. The woman found out at a different store that the products she bought were available for ₹4,900. She then complained to the cops who got her a refund.
Such incidents come as a shocker to a city where more than 33 lakh tourists visited the Taj Mahal in 2021-2022, generating revenue of ₹25.61 crore in a year, which was the highest amongst all ASI-protected sites in India, say experts in tourism and hospitality sector.
“The city of Taj has a blemish on its crown due to such incidents, which are against the spirit of ‘Atithi Devo Bhava’. Just as the fame of the Monument of Love (Taj Mahal) travels far and wide, the notoriety of goons targeting tourists also travels fast, said Deepak Dan, president of Tourist Guides Welfare Association in Agra.
“The incident on July 16 caused damage to Agra’s image as a tourist destination. Despite the victim avoiding to approach the cops and the police swinging into action on its own, much of the good work done by stakeholders in the tourism sector gets washed away by such incidents,” he said.
“Many cases of tourists being cheated by touts go unreported as the victims are under pressure because of their time-bound schedule. They rarely reach out to the police despite the Tourism Police Thana functional in Agra,” opined Dan.
ACP (Taj security) Areeb Ahmed admitted that not many tourists approached the police due to their packed schedule and time constraint.
“Only eight similar cases were registered at the tourist police station in 2022. But in 2023, nine cases have already been registered, including two by foreign tourists,” he informed.
“We have registered a case against an unauthorized guide who accompanied a minister from Vietnam to Taj Mahal,” he said.
“A case of extortion was registered against two drivers of a travel agency in Delhi who misled two Japanese tourists and brought them to Agra. Now, we have introduced a facility wherein complainants can record their statement through video calls,” said the ACP.
FATEHPUR SIKRI AWAITS SOLUTION
Fatehpur Sikri, located 40 km from Agra, saw the attack on the Swiss couple in 2017. Within a week of this incident, chief minister Yogi Adityanath visited the city and ordered for weeding out the ‘tout menace’ from Agra.
However a year later, the same Fatehpur Sikri witnessed an incident where touts allegedly pelted cops with stones. Three policemen were injured, and in retaliation, they arrested eight touts. Two cases were registered at Fatehpur Sikri police station.
However, this Unesco listed world heritage site is yet to be free of ‘tout menace’. Time and again, complaints related to tourists being overcharged by lapkas (touts) in the name of offering ‘chadar’ at Sheikh Salim Chisti Dargah have surfaced.
THE ‘DABBA’ TRADE
The term was first used in the early 1990s. It originated from the act of catching a tourist once he or she landed in the city of the Taj. Well educated, these touts mastered the art of interacting with the tourists and winning their confidence.
They focused on foreign tourists coming alone and sold goods to them, promising big cuts, a practice termed in local parlance as ‘dabba’ trade, said Sandeep Arora, president of the Agra Tourism Development Federation.
Initially, there were only a hundred of them, found mainly near the railway station, Agra Fort and Taj Mahal. They allegedly had links with local shopkeepers.
“First, they befriended the visitor. The target was then taken to a pre-decided shop, where a packed item was given to him/her for handing it over to a fictitious person residing in the tourist’s country. The visitor was given a lucrative offer of paying less for the product. In turn, the tourist was told to charge extra while handing it over to the prospective client abroad. The target usually fell for the bait of easy money and took the item. But when the tourist reached his destination and couldn’t find the receiver, he was left with no option but to use the product, which was mostly of an inferior quality,” he explained.
DANDA BINDI RACKET
Soon, a large number of complaints poured in from different embassies, giving the tourism industry in Agra and its adjoining areas a bad name. What followed was action, bringing an end to the illegal practice. But the lapkas didn’t stop here. They changed with time and moved over to a new system dubbed ‘Danda Bindi’ once the credit cards came into use, said Arora.
Under the Danda Bindi system, the lapkas got involved in cloning credit cards and withdrawing cash. Besides, they ran an ‘insurance racket’ in connivance with hospitals near the Taj.
Tourists falling sick were taken to pre-decided hospitals by the lapkas. In turn, they got cuts from the insurance money of the visitors. “In some cases, it was alleged that lapkas used to infect food items deliberately. In other cases, some foreign tourists were found to be part of the racket after being offered a share in the money made. This brought quite a bad name to the tourism industry. Visitors coming to Agra were advised not to have food here,” said Arora.
The menace gradually spread to nearby tourist spots like Fatehpur Sikri, about 40 km from Agra, said Arora. Now, even roadside hawkers and canvassers for hotels and restaurants were viewed as lapkas, he added.
LEGAL LIMITATIONS
Most of the time, these touts/local goons, when nabbed, face preventive action under Section 151 or 107/116 of Criminal Procedure Code, which involves issuance of challan, but no provision of being sent behind bars, say experts.
“The term ‘lapka’ is misleading, but prevalent in Agra. ‘Lapkagiri’ or practices undertaken by these lapkas have no mention in law books and thus they are booked under preventive action while being charged under Section 151 or 107/116 of the Criminal Procedure Code,” stated Areeb Ahmed, ACP for Taj security in Agra.
“Those found cheating tourists or physically attacking them are booked under sections for fraud, cheating, voluntarily causing hurt and sent to jail,” he claimed.
Ahmed informed that action had been taken against 278 lapkas operating around monuments between November 2022 and July 2023, and the number was significantly higher as compared to the past.
“Apart from Tourism Police Station, Taj Security Police Station is functional at the Western Gate of Taj Mahal. Those booked more than twice are booked under Goonda Act,” he added.
“We also act against those operating through fake Aadhaar card or found working as fake guide. Lost mobile phones of tourists are put on surveillance and the recovered ones are handed back to them. Those separated from families visiting monuments are re-united by police,” said Ahmed.
“We have a strategy to counter the issue of ‘lapka’ in Agra. About 30 children involved in this while working as hawkers or selling shoe covers to tourists are being educated by the police. Fourteen women found to be alone and operating near Taj are attached to a self-help group and trained to behave well with tourists,” he added.
CITIZEN CONCERN
From time to time, various initiatives have been launched to check tout menace. Director of Hindustan Institute of Management and Computer Studies, Naveen Gupta, initiated the campaign - ‘Lapka to Apka’ (LTA) - to make these touts “friends of tourists”.
“Responding to a representation, former union culture minister Mahesh Sharma had promised to bring a law to make the lapkas’ illegal acts a non-bailable offence. The same is being awaited,” said Rajiv Tiwari, chairman of the Federation of Travel Association.
“Those once booked should be identified. A record has to be maintained. Hawkers should not be tagged as lapkas but restrained within yellow lines drawn near monuments. Touching tourists or gathering around them collectively should be made punishable,” said Tiwari.
Braj Mandal Heritage Conservation Society secretary Brij Khandelwal said: “Despite having about 200 ASI protected sites, Agra lacks proper public transport system with Metro yet to start. We need to minimise the need of middle men. Tourists should get a well-defined support system of information, public transport, security, leaving no space for these lapkas.”