A fortnight long tourism festival and discount bonanza is the latest enticement for the tourists desiring to visit scenic Kashmir Valley. The festival showcasing Kashmir’s heritage with focus on less trod over but extraordinarily bewitching tourist places would begin on May 15 to give flip to domestic and foreign tourist arrivals.
The authorities are buoyed up with the arrival of whopping 124 lakh tourists and pilgrims during 2012 in the Sate and expect that the number would be overhauled this year. To boost foreign arrivals, Southeast Asia, middle-east, gulf countries and Germany have been categorised as priority areas. “We are expecting even more tourists and pilgrims this year. The number of foreign arrivals is also showing signs of improvement”, said a top tourism official.
Air India, State-owned Tourism department and Development Corporation, private hoteliers and travel operators have announced special packages for tourists visiting Kashmir between May 15 and 29. Music shows and package tours to rural Kashmir would be offered to visitors.
The festival takes off two days after the State Government gave nod to form a comprehensive tourism development policy to regulate growth of tourism along-with the conservation concerns.
The maximum footfalls are recorded at the two famous pilgrim sites - Mata Vaishno Devi in Jammu and Amarnath cave in south Kashmir. While 103 lakh pilgrims paid obeisance at the Vaishno Devi temple in 2012, as many as 6.21 lakh pilgrims visited the Amarnath cave shrine.
“Balanced approach has to be taken to rope in tourists from within the country and abroad”, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah said at the State Tourism Advisory Committee (STAC) meeting here urging the stakeholders in tourism sector to cooperate with the Government.
He said the tourist market for Kashmir in Southeast Asia, middle-east, Gulf countries and Germany need to be harnessed in full besides working for attracting tourists from other foreign countries.
Barring an initial hiccup in the aftermath of hanging of parliament attack convict Afzal Guru in February, which led to a string of protests and curfews, the tourist arrival have attained a steady pace this year. Stakeholders of the tourism industry say record number of tourists would arrive this year if the situation remains peaceful during the summer months.
Omar Abdullah said best service and hospitality to tourists is essentially required to make them visit again and again to this place. He said that while befitting infrastructure is important for comfortable stay of tourists in the State, the quality service delivery is essentially significant for this purpose.
Commissioner-cum-Secretary of the Tourism department, Atal Duloo said that Kashmir Valley recorded 13 lakh arrivals in 2012. The mountainous ladakh region, which is becoming a craze for foreign tourists and adventure enthusiasts, received more than 1.79 lakh visitors.
The STAC meeting authorised the Tourism department to formulate tourism development policy that would govern and regulate the tourism sector, help build infrastructure and address the issues of ecology and environment. The green activists have raised several objections on the unregulated arrival of tourists, which is likely to cause ecological disaster in future.
The authorities say that more than Rs. 383 crore have been sanctioned for various development projects in tourism sector during the last four years and 66 such projects have been completed during this period.
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