Members of a team of 60 tourists from Gouriya Math, in Howrah?s Ramrajatala, have alleged that they were beaten up by goons in Puri.

Sailen Ghosh, one of the tourists, said the alleged incident occurred at the bus terminus in Puri after the team refused to pay the toughs, who run a tourist extortion racket.

?The men were young and were threatening us with dire consequences if we didn?t part with cash. When we did not give in, they started thrashing us. Their accomplices materialised out of nowhere and joined the melee. The lone woman in our group was also roughed up,? Ghosh alleged.

Beaten and humiliated, the tourists tried to lodge a complaint with Puri police, but the cops ?didn?t do a thing?. The team returned home on Tuesday morning.

?We had planned to stay in Puri for some more days, but didn?t dare to after Sunday?s incident. Those goons threatened to retaliate if we went to the cops. When the police, too, didn?t cooperate, we decided it was unsafe to remain in Puri,? said Snehasish Kole, another member of the team.

According to the tourists, there were some policemen in the bus stand at the time of the violence, but they didn?t try to save the Howrah group from the wrath of the locals.

?The policemen looked the other way when we asked them for help. One of them even asked us to pay the extortionists to save ourselves time and trouble. We were dumbfounded. At the Puri police station, the cop on duty did precious little to help us,? Kole added.

The members of the group also alleged harassment at the hands of a Puri travel agent. ?A tour operator took money from us but did not allot us seats on a bus to Konark,? said Ghosh.