Flesh trade: Licence of Nurpur guesthouse cancelled

Rajiv Mahajan

Nurpur, November 20

The police today made it clear to hoteliers operating in the inter-state border areas of Nurpur that the hotels that allow flesh trade would be closed down. The state Tourism Directorate has cancelled the licence of the Grand Epic guesthouse situated on the Kandwal-Bhadroya link road at Bari on the recommendation of the Nurpur district police.

Nurpur SP Ashok Ratan said that the local police had put up a notice on the premises of the guesthouse, cautioning general public about the alleged involvement of the hotelier in immoral trafficking and the cancellation of the licence of his hotel.

A Nurpur police team, led by SHO Surinder Dhiman, had launched a crackdown against immoral trafficking in the area around two months ago. To nail a hotelier allegedly involved in flesh trade, two members of the police team posed as customers and paid hotelier Rajiv Pathania Rs 2,000 and an additional amount through Google Pay for arranging a call girl for them. The police conducted a raid and rescued a divorced woman hailing from Haryana.

The police arrested Pathania and his manager, Surya Kant, and recovered Rs 2,000 from him. A case was registered against the duo under Sections 3, 4, 5 and 6 of the Immoral Trafficking Prevention Act-1956 and Sections 370 and 342 of the IPC.

Sources said that the issue of flesh trade, which is said to be rampant in the inter-state border areas of Nurpur, had surfaced in some virtual meetings held between the SPs and the Deputy Commissioners and Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu last month.