There will be separate police force for the security and safety of travelers, said Tourism Minister Ambika Soni Thursday.

The new force will be called Tourist Security Organisation.

The tourism ministry in consultation with the ministries of home and defence and state governments had framed guidelines for forming the force, Soni said in Lok Sabha.  

“The guidelines have been sent to the state governments and union territories,” the minister said.

The ministry had first mooted the idea of a separate tourism-friendly police after the death of a 15-year-old British tourist girl in Goa in February.

Soni said the governments of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Goa, Kerala, Maharashtra, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh and Orissa have already deployed tourist police.