The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has asked the State Director General of Police (DGP) and the Union Home Secretary to act over the security threat due to overstaying of foreigners at Puri after the expiry of their VISAs.
Supreme Court lawyer and rights activist Radhakanta Tripathy has moved the apex human rights watchdog over the issue.
The petitioner has pointed out that one Mathew Furic was booked on December 2 last year for having unnatural sex with some minor boys on the Puri beach. Before police booked him he left Puri on November 26. In another case of tracing a French tourist, accused of paedophilia on Puri beach, has prompted police to start Centre-sponsored Immigration, Visa and Foreigners Registration & Tracking (IVFRT) project in the holy town. IVFRT envisages creation of nationwide online data of foreigners visiting different States and keeping a track of their movement. The Ministry of Home Affairs in May last year identified Bhubaneswar and Puri among 60 other cities for online registration of foreign tourists in 2013-14. But the project is yet to take off in Bhubaneswar and Puri, Radhakanta has alleged.
While 64,719 foreigners visited Odisha in 2012, around 90 per cent of them toured Puri.
The failure of Government in ensuring that no foreigner stays in India illegally after the expiry of the VISA results in threat to national security. They create nuisance including unnatural sex, drugs business and threat like one recent secret operation on the Jagannath Temple at Puri. All these facts and circumstances amount to violation of human rights, the petitioner pointed out, Radhakanta has pointed out.
He has requested the NHRC to issue notices and call for a report from the Union Home Secretary as to how many foreigners have been staying in India illegally and what steps have been initiated by the Ministry to keep close vigil over their movements and how the spy activities could be carried on the Jagannath Temple and unnatural sex be allowed to go on by the foreigners in the same town.