Daily Times

To promote tourism and provide security, guidance to the foreigners, Punjab Police is all set to form a Punjab Tourist Force (PTF), IG office sources told APP on Friday.

According to the police, the tourists arriving at the airports will be briefed about the tourist spots of the province. Tourism Force will keep up-to-date records of tourist places including hotels, restaurants along with tourism department. Apart from this, special counters will be created at three airports including Lahore, where staff will be posted, which has been approved by IG Punjab.Two vehicles and two heavy bikes will also be available at all times at the three airports.

There will be Special Protection Unit (SPU) for security and Punjab Highway Patrol (PHP) for tourism.Tourism Force will provide the tourists with all the information regarding their respective destination, weather conditions, regional and historical background and other details. It was worth mentioning here that the Rawalpindi police had formed a tourism-squad after the incident of misbehavior against women in Murree last year, after which inclusion of policemen have been decided and added to the tourism squad in Punjab as per the demand. Vehicles will also be provided to the tourism force from existing resources. Tourism Force will be a separate wing of regular PHP.

According to officials, the tourism force will work under the Punjab Highway Patrol Unit. The Additional IGP will head the PHP Tourism Force. Meanwhile, IG Punjab had appreciated the efforts of DIG PHP Athar Waheed in the executive board meeting and ordered to start tourism force soon.