Madhya Pradesh Tourism Board has launched a social media campaign called #BufferMeinSafar to promote wildlife tourism in the state. The campaign aims to attract tourists to its national parks and wildlife sanctuaries. While the core area of the forests are closed during monsoon until September, the buffer areas remain open for visitors. Activities in its buffer areas include safaris and bird watching besides spotting various species in the buffer zones. MP Tourism is offering packages for tourists that are specially designed keeping in mind safe travel, stay, and excursion during pandemic. The board has come up with short road itineraries mainly for two to three nights for weekend travel from neighbouring states.

As part of its ‘Mission Begin Again’, the Indian Government will permit cruise ships to commence sailing from 1 October. In light of this development, Jalesh Cruises announces the commencement of its cruise MV Karnika from 6 November, 2020. Jalesh Cruises will offer free COVID-19 rapid testing to all passengers.

SpiceJet has secured slots at London Heathrow Airport to operate flights effective September 1, 2020. This is presently under the bubble arrangement between India and UK and effective end of summer schedule i.e. October 23, 2020. It is in discussion to secure slots for winter schedule for regular operations.

HVS ANAROCK’S latest monthly newsletter titled ‘Hotels & Hospitality Overview India’ reveals that Kochi was the top performing market in India in June with negative growth in RevPAR at 50.3 per cent, followed by New Delhi at 72.4 per cent. Bengaluru and Goa were the lowest performers for the month of June 2020. 

In an effort to bring back tourism to India, 12 inbound operators will travel to Rajasthan between 6-9 August, 2020. The initiative named ‘Unlocking Tourism – India is Ready’ will have a 20-people contingent visiting offbeat destinations of Rajasthan namely Tijara, Kesroli, Talabgaon and Geejgarh. The idea was conceived in a Whatsapp group called ‘Inbound Fraternity’ and was further initiated by Sanjay Razdan, Managing Director of Razdan Holidays, and Sunil Misra, Managing Director of Cosmos Travel.

In a series of online meetings, 35 registered trade associations representing different tourism sectors from Kerala unanimously decided to continue under one organisation called Confederation of Kerala Tourism Industry (CKTI). They re-elected EM Najeeb as President. A 65-member committee and 35-member Task force was also formed. Sajeev Kurup, Former Secretary of KTM Society, has been elected as the General Secretary. The main aim of CKTI is to ensure survival and then revival of the industry during and after the pandemic.

The India offices of Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) in New Delhi and Mumbai have launched a digital campaign #TogetherThailand to increase their engagement with the India travel trade. The month-long campaign starting from August 5 will feature weekly contests on four different themes for each week to update the trade on destinations, products and services in Thailand that can be planned for post COVID-19 travel scenarios. Each week, the contest will be uploaded every Wednesday on the basis of unique theme. The first week’s theme is ‘Amazing beaches in Thailand’.

The latest edition of UNWTO World Tourism Barometer shows that the lockdown led to a 98 per cent fall in international tourist numbers in May when compared to 2019, and a 56% year-on-year drop in arrivals between January and May. This translates into a fall of 300 million tourists and US$320 billion lost in international tourism receipts.

WTM London is going ahead this year as planned on 2-4 November, 2020 at ExCeL. If attendees aren’t able to travel for the live event, WTM is also hosting ‘WTM London Virtual’ on 10-11 November. The virtual event will feature live conference sessions, roundtables, speed networking sessions, one-to-one meetings, and virtual networking sessions. The theme of WTM this year will be ‘Connecting the industry together’.

The government has notified changes in FDI norms on civil aviation, which will permit non-resident Indian nationals to own 100% stake of Air India. The gazette notification states that foreign investments in Air India, including that of foreign airlines shall not exceed 49% either directly or indirectly except in case of NRIs, who are Indian Nationals, where it is permitted up to 100%.