Tourism Minister G Kishan Reddy has written to Ratan Tata and the Tata Group, seeking investment within the travel and tourism industry through Public Private Partnerships (PPP) model, which was suggested by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a post-Budget webinar. 

In an interview with businessline, Reddy said private investment in the tourism sector in India, beyond hotels, is minimal, and efforts are being made to encourage private investors to invest in the sector.

The Tata Group, which is a leading player in both the hospitality and aviation industry, has assured Reddy that they “will thoroughly look into investing within the travel and tourism sector”. The group’s hospitality arm, Indian Hotels Company Limited, has a portfolio of 260 hotels, including 73 under development globally across four continents, 11 countries, and over 125 locations. Additionally, the Tata Group has four airlines under its umbrella, including Air India, Vistara, Air Asia, and Air India Express.

The MoT is set to organise India’s first global tourism investors’ summit in May to promote India and generate investments within the sector. While the minister did not specify a threshold of investments that the ministry is looking at, he said these “investments will reduce budget constraints from the Ministry”.

“The promotion of tourism has been a key focus of the government,” said Reddy, adding that efforts are being made to involve players from across segments, associations, and strata. “The ministry has also been involved in the startup ecosystem and has written to the biggest corporates within India,” he explained.

G20 presidency has also been promoting tourism in India, with the MoT focusing on film tourism, adventure tourism, and spiritual tourism. Secretary, Tourism, Arvind Singh, said he expects that with the boost of the G20, “foreign tourist arrivals (FTAs) will cross pre-Covid levels by the end of this calendar year.” At present, FTAs are at 60-65 per cent of pre-Covid levels.

Travel agents

The Minister said there are primarily two issues within the travel industry that are being addressed through proposals that have been submitted to the Cabinet and are likely to be approved soon. The first issue concerns the accreditation of travel agents with the MoT, as currently only 900 out of the thousands of travel agents in India are accredited due to certain criteria limitations. The minister assured that this will be resolved along with the implementation of the National Travel Policy. 

The second demand pertains to the reinstatement of the popular “Incredible India” campaign. The Minister said a request has been made to utilise the campaign for promoting India overseas.

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