The Capital is set to receive its first anti-touting law after facing the menace of touts for years without any kind of law or penal system.

The proposal was initiated earlier this year and will be decided at a high-level meeting in Raj Niwas next week under the aegis of Lieutenant-Governor Tejendra Khanna, it is learnt.

Police Commissioner Y S Dadwal, who has been pushing for the law, told Newsline that Jammu and Kashmir and Goa are the only states with anti-touting laws at present.

Delhi Chief Secretary Rakesh Mehta said, “The police find it difficult to control this increasing menace as there is no law in place to prosecute touts at present. And as the Commonwealth Games approaches, it becomes imperative that touting is dealt with sternly.”

He said the police approached the government earlier this year to help them draw up a law. “Our home and legal departments are looking into the issue,” he said.

The Delhi government’s tourism department has already proposed that Goa’s anti-touting law be replicated in the Capital.

But Dadwal said Delhi Police wants “a more effective law than the one in Goa or Jammu and Kashmir to properly curb touting”. The law, he said, is strict in those two states because their economy, to a large extent, depends on tourists. “But most tourists land in Delhi — this city is a tourist destination in itself. We have been pushing for a Delhi-specific law for some time now.”

Mehta said, “Touting is not a one-off incident: it is an organised crime, and the police want to treat it as such.”

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