Category Archives: States

Prabhulal Joshi, President, Maharashtra Tour Organisers Association (MTOA), believes the industry is looking at another year of losses due to the second wave of infections. “Post October, things had picked up, bookings had started for the April-May holiday season. But everything now has again come to a standstill. The combined loss to the industry is estimated to be nearly Rs 200 crore,” he says.  

Regional carrier TruJet has secured Andhra Pradesh Government nod for viability gap funding (VGF) to continue its Chennai- Kadapa-Vijayawada and Vijayawada-Kadapa-Chennai routes for one more year starting from May 1, 2021. The State Cabinet approved a move to provide about Rs 20 crore per year as VGF by the state government.

In its latest order, Government of Goa has prohibited inter-state movement for tourists till May 24. Exceptions to the rule are people who are residents of Goa or are entering Goa for work, or who have with them full vaccination certificate or COVID-negative test report for a test done a maximum of 72 hours prior to entering Goa.

Department of Tourism, Government of Maharashtra, will hold a two-day international conference on the potential of Agri-tourism on May 15-16, 2021. The virtual event will include interactive sessions to discuss farm tourism in India, and will focus on empowering and encouraging the rural women farming community to embrace new opportunities in the realm.

Tourist hotspots like Calangute and Candolim in North Goa will continue to be under lockdown, even as the government has lifted the lockdown in other parts of the state, Goa’s Ports Minister Michael Lobo has said. The panchayats of Calangute, Candolim and Arpora-Nagoa have passed orders to continue the lockdown to curb the spread of the infection, said the MLA from Calangute.

As part of virtual activities for commemoration of 75 Years of India’s Independence, India Tourism recently organised an online presentation for the travel and tourism students of Shri MD Shah Mahila College of Arts & Commerce in Mumbai. Participants were informed about the on-going ‘Dekho Apna Desh’ webinar series of the Ministry of Tourism and were encouraged to join the same. The specially edited video from the Dekho Apna Desh webinar series   “Lesser known stories of India’s struggle against the British” was also shown. This was attended by around 100 students and faculty members.

According to a study done by the university using data from India and five other countries, using domestic travel bans to control COVID-19 infections may be inadvisable. It found that imposing travel bans can counter-intuitively increase the total spread of coronavirus disease, creating a ‘lose-lose situation’. The national lockdown in the first wave trapped millions of migrants inside big cities like Mumbai that were fast-growing coronavirus hotspots.

In order to provide timely assistance to its members and the fraternity at large, ADTOI has formed a task force from among its members. Rajiv Arora of Phoenix Holidays, New Delhi has been made in-charge of this task force along with some volunteers who will coordinate and collecting the authenticity of information which will then be circulated to all members pan India. Its main task will be to collect authentic information on availability of oxygen cylinders, ventilators, beds at hospitals, medicines, etc.

The tourism fraternity in Kerala will observe May 1 as Black Day to pressure the state government to resolve problems faced by the sector. Tourism Samrakshana Samithi, an umbrella body of 20 organisations, will observe the Labour Day state wide by wearing black masks. A social media campaign #SaveTourism too will be launched. An immediate financial package of ₹250 crore to support tourism workers, financial aid as loan worth ₹2,500 crore through the Kerala Bank and restructuring of all loans in the sector are some of the demands.

Speaking on during a webinar conducted by the MoT recently, Rupinder Brar, Additional Director General, Ministry of Tourism discussed the important of training programmes for students in the hospitality and service industry and how more and more students should be encouraged to participate in these programme in near future by the tourism industry.