Crackdown on Kolkata guesthouses

Police have arrested the owner of a guest house near Thakurpukur Cancer Hospital in Kolkata because a Bangladesh national was nabbed from it without travel documents. Subrata Mitra, DC (Southwest) of Kolkata police said the arrested Bangladesh citizen, Mujibur Rahman, was being interrogated by the mobile task force of the city police. “Rahman has no valid travel document for being in India, and prima facie, he has no reason to be staying in the guest house near the Cancer Hospital because he has no relative or friend being treated there,” Mitra claimed. Vineet Chandra Haldar, owner of the Padma Guest House at Thakurpukur in the capital of India’s West Bengal state, was picked up by police for providing accommodation to Rahman without asking for valid travel document and identification. “Before the elections in West Bengal, we want to ensure no foreigner with doubtful intention stays in the city. That is why we have warned all guesthouses frequented by foreigners with severe action if they are found to accommodate anyone without valid travel documents,” Mitra said. The state police’s intelligence branch is keeping a watch on such guesthouses in view of reports that some fugitives from a neighbouring country have fled into Kolkata to evade police action in their own country, according to bdnews24.com.