India's first tourist police station opens in Kochi

Kochi (Kerala), Mar 1 (ANI): Kochi in Kerala has become the first city in the country to have a tourist specific police station.

Kerala cops are determined to protect and mobilise tourists from foreign countries, thereby proving that they can help the state be more tourists friendly.

Home and Tourism Minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan on Saturday officially inaugurated the country's first international tourist police station and a police museum at Mattanchery near Kochi, which is said to be the first of its kind in the country.

Mattanchery, which is known world over for the Jewish synagogue and holds an important place in the map, receives tourists in large numbers.

The special station will have all facilities to assist foreign travellers, to clear their doubts on passport and visa, guidelines to lodge complaints about lost passports and to renew expired visas.

The police would tie-up with Department of Tourism to set up a helpdesk at the station, where route maps and brochures about different tourist destinations in the State would be available.Also, the station will have facilities for tourists to make booking for boating as well as hiring taxis.

A tourism carnival in which there were 80 floats, including folk dancers performing and police uniforms were also taken out on the occasion.

Another highlight is the police museum that would display police uniforms and armoury used in the force, right from the colonial period to the present.

State owned Tourism Department would initiate to publish all the details of tourism police and its services in all leading tourism journals in the world. By Juhan Samuel (ANI)