India to double tourist numbers by 2016
Dubai:The Indian government is taking steps to double the current figure of six million tourists visiting the country each year by 2016 through promoting wellness and medical tourism.
India gets just over six million tourists every year and the government wants to double this number by the year 2016, Tourism Minister Subodh Kant Sahai said.
Sahai said currently outbound tourists from India are four times more than inbound tourists, a figure the government wants to improve.
Speaking at a recent Incredible India Road Show, the Minister pointed out the country needed around Rs 40,000 crore to develop India’s tourism industry, starting with 200,000 rooms, exhibition centres, convention centres and theme parks.
“There is scope for promoting wellness tourism, medical tourism by propagating ayurveda and yoga etc. We have the Himalayas, we have 7,000 km of coastal areas that are all potential tourist attractions,” the minister said.
A tourism promotion forum will be set up at the Indian Embassy in Abu Dhabi which will have representation from the tourism industry and suggest ways to for improvement.
Speaking on the occasion, India’s ambassador to the UAE M K Lokesh said there is a lot of diversity in terms of tourist attractions in India.India is the third largest source of foreign tourists to the UAE.
Tour operators and airline officials also attended a B2B session that was organised on the sidelines of the Road Show.There has been a consistent growth of foreign tourist arrivals from the Gulf and the Middle East region to India over the last 2-3 years with year 2010 having registered an overall growth of around 17 per cent over the previous year.
According to India Tourism officials, foreign tourist arrivals in India touched 6.29 million in 2011.Till May this year, the number had reached 2.8 million and the foreign exchange earning during this period stood at USD 7297 million.
The ministry of tourism has set an aim to increase India’s share in international tourist arrivals from 0.6 per cent to 1 per cent by the year 2016. -PTI / ZeeNews
