MODI GOVT TO IMPLEMENT E-VISA SOON
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Shripad Yesso Naik, Tourism & Culture Minister of India, while addressing the attendees at a Gala Welcome Reception organised by Indian Association of Tour Operators (IATO) to formally welcome him, stated that the Modi Government will implement Electronic Visa Authorization (E-Visa) soon. IATO organised the welcome reception in New Delhi to honour Naik.
Pronab Sarkar, Secretary, IATO introduced the Minister and all the VIP invitees. The list included Parvez Dewan, Secretary (Tourism); Ravindra Singh, Secretary (Culture); Girish Shankar, Additional Secretary (Tourism); Anand Kumar, Joint Secretary (Tourism); Usha Sharma, Additional Director General (Tourism), Govt. of India; Dr. Rakesh Tiwari, Director General, ASI and Dr. Sameer Sharma, Managing Director, ITDC.
Subhash Goyal, President, IATO, while extending the welcome to Naik, said “The efforts put by members to ensure BJP comes to power as it was the only party which in its Election manifesto talked about T-5 and one of which included Tourism. That gave the confidence and optimistic feeling that our new Minister will be the Messiah for the betterment of the industry. He also talked about the bottle neck areas which brought stagnation in the growth of tourism viz over taxation to tourism sector, visa issues, multiple state taxes specially road taxes and air connectivity from new markets.”
He also emphasised the need for early implementation of e-travel visa, which was a positive decision to boost international arrivals by the then Government but now if this is implemented in full earnest, it can immediately give a big boost in international tourist arrivals. “The urgent need is to resolve the service tax part as it has made holiday package cost prohibitive,” he stated.
Sarkar reiterated that, considering the importance of tourism in employment generation, national economic growth and foreign exchange earnings, the then NDA Government under the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, exempted all the tour operators from service tax. Also service tax was exempted on the foreign exchange earning of the tour operators. This facility needs to be reinstated. “If these two issues are given priority we can assure you Sir, there will be immediate 50 per cent growth in tourist arrival,” added Goyal.
Dewan was very pleased to announce that the Minister had already reviewed the issues related to tourism and already seized with the matter. He is focusing on new markets incentives to tourism and diversification of tourism products. Singh, in his very educative address talked about the new initiatives of Ministry of Culture. He also talked about the proposed Festival of India in South Asian countries and the festival of India which has already commenced in China.
These festivals showcase India in its variety and is organised with the collaboration of information and Broadcasting Ministry, Ministry of External Affairs and Ministry of Tourism and whole presentation is with Incredible India branding to have positive image about India. He further spoke about the promotion of museums as museums have global popularity and we have good collections in our museums.
While raising the vote of thanks, Sarab Jit Singh, Sr. Vice President, IATO expressed how the Prime Minister’s vision for modernisation of railways with high speed trains, infrastructure development, low cost airports to promote air connectivity to smaller tourist places, modernisation of existing ports, use of water resources all these are also going to boost tourism once implemented.