Tourism industry seeks infrastructure status

The stakeholders of tourism industry have demanded the Centre to accord ‘infrastructure’ status to the industry and reduce a host of taxes imposed upon it. The 94th Annual Tourism Summit organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), held here on Wednesday, has passed a resolution in this regard.

The summit has also recommended to various state governments to conduct a survey to plan unique selling propositions and increase investment incentives. Among other suggestions made by the summit include rationalisation of tax structure, relaxation of licensing norms for new hotels and providing modern and supportive infrastructure to improve connectivity at all tourist locations in the country.

Elaborating the summit recommendations, Lokesh Kumar, AVP, Head-Hospitality Practice Technopak Advisors, called for comprehensive measures to jointly promote and showcase all south Indian states. “There is a need to offer a comfortable experience to the foreign tourists to thoroughly explore history, culture, art and adventure. To achieve this goal we need to promote ‘Brand India’ globally further,” he said.

Madhur Bajaj, Chairman, CII National Committee on Tourism said, “The conditions are improving post 26/11. Foreign tourists arrivals are very important for the tourism industry to thrive. India has so much to offer to a foreign tourist in the forms of Eco tourism, medical tourism or adventure tourism.”

Other speakers at the summit called for promoting eco-tourism. “Eco tourism gains importance from the fact that we just have about 8 years to reverse the global warming. If we do not take steps to conserve our environment now, the result would be the whole world becoming a desert 30 years from now,” Rakesh Mathur, President, Welcome Heritage Hotels, said.