Centre mulls new policy for rural tourism

Recently a 39-year old Swiss woman was gang-raped last month in Madhya Pradesh's Datia district

Stirred up by the unfortunate incident of gang rape of a Swiss national last month that tarnished India’s image as a tourist destination, the Union Ministry of Tourism is mulling to formulate a policy on rural tourism for inbound foreign tourists.

“In the near future, after a convenient meeting with the ministers of the respective states, we will take a delegation to the home ministry and very strictly, we will give instructions to each and every foreign tourist wanting to experience rural tourism in the country,” K Chiranjeevi, Union minister of state for tourism told media persons here.

He said, the policy has to be formed after synchronising with the home ministry, external affairs ministry and state ministries. He was in the city to attend the inaugural function of the new campus of the Indian Institute of Tourism and Travel Management in the city.

“Since this involves other ministries, we will be holding an inter-ministerial meeting and on the basis of its decisions and recommendations, we will draw a strategy,” said Usha Sharma, additional director general, Union ministry of tourism.

It may be noted that a 39-year old Swiss woman was gang-raped last month in Madhya Pradesh’s Datia district. The woman and her partner who were on a cycling trip from Central to north India were attacked by eight men.

The Swiss ambassador in India, Linus Von Castelmur, had demanded a swift probe of the incident by Indian authorities.

The apex industry body – Associated Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Assocham) in its report said that the heinous acts that took place especially in Delhi and Madhya Pradesh impacted the tourism industry not only in NCR region but also in other major cities like Chennai, Bangalore, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Pune, Ahemdabad, Lucknow, Jaipur, Dehradun and Agra.

According to the Assocham report published in March, foreign tourists inflow into India have registered a significant drop of 25 per cent in the last three months and that too in the busy tourism season after rape incidents were reported in India.