Category Archives: Associations

Senior officials from the ATOAI Team met with the Tourism Minister, Shri G. Kishan Reddy on 19th October to discuss the various possibilities of the promotion of adventure tourism in the country. ATOAI requested the Minister to give special focus to the promotion of adventure tourism in overseas and India in all MoT Campaigns. The Minister has assured full cooperation to the association for the same. ATOAI also presented the Indian Adventure Tourism Guidelines booklet to the Minister and requested him to push all the States and the Union Territories to adopt the guidelines officially and follow them in letter and spirit.

Rajiv Mehra, President, IATO, has said that with the reinstating of visas they have requested for reinstating airport passes. “Another issue we have taken up with the Government is the restoration of airport passes because when tourist traffic starts, people will start coming. Hence, our airport passes need to be restored immediately. We are in touch with the Government for the same. Also, they have reduced the number of passes per company, which we will cope with currently, but take it up once business comes back. We are in talks for all these issues and I am hopeful that by November 15, some of these major issues are sorted out,” he shared.

A delegation of TAAI Gujarat Chapter met Naved Desai, Ahmedabad Airport Manager. In the meeting, they suggested to have advance token system of Rapid test for those who wanted to travel to Dubai. They also asked to share airport resurfacing plan to some professional agency to avoid frequent runway closure, which badly affect travel schedule. The TAAI delegation also suggested to form one advisory committee with a representative of travel trade also. Desai gave assurance to action on most of the requests and informed of major expansion of Ahmedabad Airport in phased manner.

Paras Lakhia, Managing Committee Member and Chairman, Airlines Council, TAAI represented the travel trade fraternity in a meeting on Ministry of Civil Aviation’s draft ‘Heli-Tourism Policy’. In the meeting, he said that Heli business may pick up fast if Aerial tours at Tourist destinations could be started on priority so that travellers and visitors may see the entire place in limited time. His suggestions in the meeting included inviting players to foray into the vertical of Heli Tourism & emphasis was given on the need of developing Heli infrastructure at the same pace as developing airports & seaports. He also mentioned that all-important religious and hill station destinations especially where road journey is tedious but are well visited and popular should be facilitated with Heli service from its nearest airport or seaport. This includes destinations & routes, such as Hampi, Coorg, Kevadia, Munnar, Goa, Udaipur to Nathdwara, Delhi to Agra, Bengaluru to Mysore, Srinagar to Gulmarg & many more.

Rajiv Mehra, President, IATO, has shared that e-Tourist visa website has been opened for foreigners, for 30 day validity, which will be counted in the free 5 lakh visa granted by GoI. However, he said that e-visa for UK and Canada has still not been opened, and they still need to apply for paper visa. In addition, the Government should also start scheduled international flights.

Jyoti Mayal, President, TAAI, has said that in the tech era upgrading ourselves and our businesses is the need of the hour. “Post pandemic, I can assure that our fraternity will come out with the most innovative solutions. Even though our services are right-now being experienced and gauged only online by a set of travellers, however, we are doing our best to facilitate smooth, and hassle-free travel for customers from every aspect. We are now offering marketing solutions based on technology and upgraded ourselves by facilitating training programmes. However, to hand-hold and support our customers we need to come on ground,” she said.

In a meeting with industry associations on overseas promotions, Ministry of Tourism has proposed in that they wanted to declare 2022-23 as Visit India year, starting from August 15, 2022. “However, we suggested that it should start from January 1, 2022. If they want Visit India Year to be successful and meaningful, they should provide some incentives to the tour operators or tourists who want to visit India. Otherwise, it’d remain just a slogan,” he suggested.

Federation of Hotel & Restaurant Associations of India (FHRAI) and Event and Entertainment Management Association (EEMA) have jointly planned to organise a nationwide campaign to sensitize industry stakeholders including the Police as well as general public about hotels or wedding venues not requiring to obtain license for playing any sound recording for marriage and related social or religious functions held at the venues.

Sudesh Poddar, recently-elected president of Hotel & Restaurant Association of Eastern India, says, “In spite of several requests to all state governments we haven’t been able to get any relaxation of property tax. There has been no relaxation of excise license fees too. We have sent several letters and sent delegations to respective departments without any effect. We have met several ministries and relevant government departments with our requests, but we haven’t been able to resolve these issues.”  

Travel Agents Federation of India (TAFI) has done a special tie-up with Sarovar Hotels across India for offering special hotel rates to TAFI members. An initiative by the TAFI Hotels & Resorts Committee, the tie up will allow members to sell inventory of these hotels and resorts using these special rates for their clients. Jigar Dudakiya, Committee Representative, TAFI, says, “To use the facilities, TAFI members must have a TAFI logo and membership number on their email signature. The same will be verified and checked for authenticity by principals. Team TAFI is Pro-actively working to get more such deals to benefit their members.”