<i>Most hoteliers ignore police advice </i>
Photo: STAR
Criminals continue to use city's residential hotels as a base to plan criminal activities and a hideout after committing crimes, but the hoteliers tend to ignore the police advice to collect information about their boarders.
"Many hoteliers do not ask their guests to fill out the questionnaire we gave them," said a senior official at the Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP). "The questionnaire is designed to collect some specific information on the boarders so that we can have an idea of what kind of people are staying at the hotels.
DMP sources said three murders took place in city hotels last month.
The DMP official said most of the hotel boarders enjoy the luxury of being anonymous. A lot of people use fake names, identifications and address to book rooms and hide their real identities, making it difficult to track criminals.
“We advised the hoteliers to ask their boarders to fill in the questionnaire so that we can monitor conducts of the hotels and contact the boarders in case we need their help in investigation to solve a case," he said.
In a bid to curb crime and unsocial activities in city hotels, the police gave the hoteliers the special questionnaire with a set of 24 questions.
The forms are designed to collect personal information on the boarders such as names, addresses, passport identification numbers and driving licence numbers of the boarders along with cellular phone numbers. The police have also instructed the hotel authorities to verify the authenticity of the cellphone numbers provided by the boarder.
They are also required to have a digital camera and take a photo of the guests.
The hotel authorities are to send the documents to the local police station daily.
However, a good number of hotels are not following the police instructions. Some of them alleged that the police officers are not enforcing the new regulations properly and not providing them with the said form or any instructions.
Meanwhile, gruesome murders continue to take place in city hotels. On August 6, a woman was strangled in a hotel at Shyamoli. According to hotel authorities, the victim's husband was a regular boarder, and therefore he was not asked to fill in the form.
Another girl was murdered in a hotel at Fakirapul on August 1. Reportedly, the girl came to the hotel with a young man who introduced themselves as a married couple.
After the homicide, police picked up the manager of the hotel. The acting manager of the hotel alleged that the police did not provide them with the forms. That is why they could not ask their boarders to fill in the forms on that particular day.
Since then each and every boarder of the hotel is asked to fill out the form and their photos are taken as advised by the police, claimed the acting manager.
A taxicab driver was murdered in a hotel at Mohakhali recently. Police arrested two people as suspects who had reportedly taken the driver to the hotel and murdered him.
The hotel has been under lock and key since the incident and its staff members have been in hiding.
Sources said the hotel never bothered to follow the instructions given by the police and never stored information about their guests.
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