'Guj govt spent Rs 62 crore on hosting festivals in two years'

The Gujarat government has spent over Rs 62 crore in the last two years on organising various festivals which attracted over 4,900 foreign tourists, the Legislative Assembly was told today.

During Question Hour, Congress MLA Shailesh Parmar sought details of the expenditure incurred by the government in organising various festivals in 2016 and 2017.

He also sought to know the number of foreign tourists having visited these festivals, such as the Kite Festival, Beach Festival and Rann Utsav among others.

In a written reply, Tourism Minister Ganpat Vasava stated that his department had spent Rs 62.09 crore on organising such events.

While the the total expenditure stood at Rs 21.14 crore in 2016, it almost doubled in 2017 when the total cost shot up to Rs 40.94 crore, Vasava said in the reply.

The state government organised a total of 14 different festivals during the above period, prominent among them the Kite Festival, Beach Festival, Gir Monsoon Festival, Tarnetar Fair, Navratri, Rann-Utsav and Tribal Festival.

As per the reply, a total of 4,940 foreign tourists visited these festivals.

While 2,218 tourists from other countries visited these festivals in 2016, a total of 2,722 in 2017.

Notably, out of the total 14 festivals organised by the government, not a single foreign tourist took part in ten such events in both the years.

Only Kite Festival, Tarnetar Fair, Navratri and Rann Utsav could attract foreign tourists, as per the minister.