India will provide one lakh free visas in a bid to draw foreign tourists, Tourism Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat announced on Friday.
Along with free visas, Shekhawat also announced the launch of a programme to appoint local residents as tourism ambassadors at 50 destinations. The government's initiative to offer free visas and appoint tourism ambassadors (Paryatan Mitra and Paryatan Didi) is aimed at projecting India as a tourist friendly all-year-round destination.
The announcements made on the occasion of World Tourism Day come on the back of slower-than-anticipated growth in foreign tourist arrivals.
Arrivals in India have grown 9 per cent on a year-on-year basis to 4.78 million in January-June of 2024. Yet these are lower compared to 2019.
Pandemic-hit
The government had offered five lakh free visas in 2021 to boost the tourism sector that was severely impacted by the pandemic. Despite several initiatives and restoration of air connectivity, foreign tourist arrival in India lags global average. Shekhawat, however, said India has projected itself as the most desirable destination on the back of infrastructure developments, digital initiatives and successful hosting of the G-20 summit last year.
The Ministry piloted the Paryatan Mitra and Paryatan Didi programme in six destinations before expanding it. Cab drivers, hotel staff, street vendors, students among others were trained about hospitality as a part of the scheme.
The Ministry also unveiled Incredible India content hub, a repository of films, images, newsletters etc and signed MOUs with hotel chains for student engagement and mentorship.
Industry hails move
Travel industry stakeholders welcomed the Ministry’s initiatives. Aashish Gupta, CEO, Federation of Associations in Indian Tourism and Hospitality, said the move of free visas need to be further backed by aggressive international brand marketing of Indian tourism and presence of tourism officials in key source markets.
“We welcome the announcement and hope it would give much needed fillip to foreign tourist arrivals which so far are not showing an upswing. In addition we need to undertake publicity drive in our source market like UK, US, Canada, France and Italy,” said Rajiv Mehra, President of Indian Association of Tour Operators.