A new team was elected unopposed for TAAI’s Uttar Pradesh & Uttarakhand Chapter during a mid-term election that took place in Lucknow. The new office bearers include SMA Sheeraz as Chairman, Swati Dimri as Secretary, and Mohammed Khalid Shah as Treasurer for the term ending July 2021. The chapter currently has 88 members.

According to data received from Cleartrip, flight booking volumes have doubled since July-August due to significant amount of pent-up demand and have reached around 50% levels of the last year.

Officials from Gujarat Tourism recently met up with two national and three regional travel trade associations in Kolkata along with other travel agents and tour operators in order to promote tourism offerings in the state, particularly the Statue of Unity in Kevadia. Around 85 people attended this event at Hotel Astor. Gujarat is also planning to conduct fam trips for the trade-in smaller groups of 25 pax. Present at the occasion were Nilanjan Basu, Secretary of Travel Agents Association of Bengal; Koushik Banerjee, Chapter Chairman of Enterprising Travel Agents Association; Kamal Gupta, Secretary of Association of Tourism Service Provider of Bengal; and Supratim Sinha, Secretary of Travel Agents Hoteliers & Travellers.

Yatra.com, leading online travel portal conducted its annual festive survey amongst 5000 respondents, highlighting what the travel trends look like in the new normal. The survey indicated an uptick in demand for travel as almost 75% of respondents said they are planning to take up a vacation compared to 2019 where 61% of respondents were willing to go on a holiday during the festive season. The trend of advance booking continues with 39.3% of respondents planning leisure trips for more than one month in advance to rest, relax, and recuperate. Safety and hygiene take priority while planning a holiday as travelers are looking at the number of cases in the vicinity, sanitization measures adopted, government guidelines, amenities in case of emergency, among other factors. The survey revealed that about 52.5% of respondents are seeking medical/travel insurance for the sake of security and more than 50% of respondents said that they would be prefer ordering room service rather than visiting restaurants and bars. Taking extra safety precautions, about 72.1% of respondents said that they will be going through sanitization processes followed by monuments and tourist spots before planning a visit to them. This assurance is important as about 48.2% of respondents are planning their holiday with the family.  Interestingly, beating beaches as a preferred location for holiday goers, 37.9% of respondents said they would like to visit the hills, to escape the monotony and stress brought by the pandemic. Budget travel continues to see a spike as 35.4% of respondents are keeping Rs.10,000-Rs.25,000 per person as set targets for their budget during vacations. Commenting on this survey Sabina Chopra, Co-Founder and COO, Corporate Travel & Head Industry Relations, Yatra.com, said, “Over the years, consumers have given priority to various aspects of travel while planning a trip …

During a webinar organised by IATO and TravTalk on redesigning wellness itineraries, Rajeev Nambiar, Director, National Teachers Desk, Art of Living said that 2 week-long itinerary is ideal for visiting India for wellness tourism. He further said that the Art of Living International Center in Bengaluru offers various programs for wellness, recreation and yoga.

Tourism Minister of Andhra Pradesh, Muttamsetti Srinivasa Rao has said that the state government plans to establish 7-star and 5-star hotels at 12 locations across the state. These locations are Gandikota, Kakinada, Pichukalanka, Horsley Hills, Nagarjuna Sagar, Suryalanka beach, Orvakal, Kalingapatnam, Rushikonda, Bhavani Island, Tirupati-Perur and Polavaram. To attract investors, roadshows will also be conducted.  

IRCTC has come up with an initiative to promote domestic tourism where it is proposing to extend its base to travel agents accredited with trade associations like FAITH, IATO, ADTOI and sign agreements with select agents in every state and UT of the country. The agents then working with IRCTC will get a commission on cut and pay basis online.

IndiGo has become the first Low-Cost Carrier (LCC) to have started IATA -Billing and Settlement Plan acceptance in Overseas Point of sales using  IATA Financial Gateway (IFG) Currently, this facility is being offered in point of Sales at the United Arab Emirates, Qatar & United Kingdom and soon will be opened in 8 more overseas markets.

Prahlad Singh Patel, Minister of State (I/C), Tourism & Culture, conducted a review meeting with the officials of the Ministry of Tourism on Incredible India Portal new information features. All the senior officials of the ministry, including, Yogendra Tripathi, Secretary; Meenakshi Sharma, DG; Rupinder Brar, ADG; and Rakesh Verma, Joint Secretary, were present at the meeting.

B2B hotel booking portal, GRN Connect has won the prestigious TravTalk-WTM World Travel Leaders Award for having a positive impact on tourism and hospitality industry in India. The B2B operator with access to around 400,000 hotels and 200,000 villas and more than 30,000 on- and -offline agents in 108 countries access its inventory was announced winner during a virtual ceremony where businesses were nominated by WTM Official Media Partners. Getting recognised for embracing the mantra- recover, rebuild & innovate, Deepak Narula, Managing Director, GRNConnect said, “Our business ground to a halt at the peak of the pandemic, and we quickly started to rebuild our business for the future by identifying areas where we could make a difference to our suppliers and partners.”