Category Archives: MOT

Rakesh Kumar Verma, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Tourism has said that the ministry will launch a responsible traveller campaign on the upcoming World Tourism Day 2021. “This World Tourism Day, we would be formally launching the responsible traveller campaign. I would like to request state governments to also support the campaign and make it a great success,” he said.

To strengthen the hospitality & tourism industry, the Ministry of Tourism (MOT) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Yatra. The primary objective of this MoU is to provide extensive visibility to accommodation units, which have self-certified themselves on SAATHI on the OTA platform.

Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs in the Second Modi Cabinet, Arjun Ram Meghwal and Member of Parliament from New Delhi Parliamentary constituency, Meenakshi Lekhi have been made the new Minister of State for Culture post the latest cabinet reshuffle by the PM Narendra Modi when 43 new ministers took the oath. Member of Parliament from Bikaner, Meghwal formerly served as Chief Whip and Minister of State for Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises. Lekhi is also a lawyer in the Supreme Court of India.

Shripad Yesso Naik and Ajay Bhatt have been made the new Minister of State for Tourism post the latest cabinet reshuffle by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Both the new ministers will work under the Minister of Tourism, G Kishan Reddy who has been given charge of MOT apart from the Ministry of Culture.

G Kishan Reddy has become the new Minister of Tourism and Minister of Culture. He takes over from Prahlad Singh Patel, who took over office on 30th May 2019. He has also been made the Minister of Development of the North Eastern Region. MOT also gets a Minister of State with Shripad Yesso Naik being appointed as the new Minister of State for Tourism the news came after a cabinet reshuffle was announced by Prime Minister Modi.

Rakesh Verma, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Tourism, has shared that the MOT is currently working on NIDHI+ platform. “We are consolidating on what we had built as a platform and also building SAATHI framework for other quality certifications also. NIDHI+ looks at four elements. One is the registration of units, which could be hospitality units, tour operators, travel agents, and all kinds of tourism service providers. Second is consolidation of quality certification, including sustainability certification and adventure tourism certification. We are also working with OTAs for integrating database and trying to build a unified database, as well as to help our tourism service providers get listed on OTAs and Incredible India website. The 4th pillar is working with the ministries of MSME and FRRO offices, because they also have database of hospitality units and MSME units, which would allow us to remove duplicacies and help build one unified database,” he added.  

Indian carriers can now operate 15% more domestic flights with the government raising the cap on the same from 50% of pre-Covid level to 65% from this week. During the pandemic, the aviation ministry has been regulating both domestic fares and capacity. Now that the second wave is ebbing and daily cases have fallen, the domestic capacity — which was reduced from 80% of pre-Covid to 50% on June 1 — has been increased.

Arvind Singh, Secretary, Ministry of Tourism, has said that after considerable follow-up from all sides, even from Ministry of Commerce, the Department of Expenditure has said that they will release over Rs2,000 crore for SEIS in this financial year and a new budget has to be created. “The formalities have to be worked out, after which the amount will reach beneficiaries,” he shared.

The Ministry of Tourism has invited entries for the National Tourism Awards 2018-19. The last date for receipt of entries in the respective divisions in August 10, 2021, 16:00 Hrs. Entries are requested in hard copy, with accompanying material to send in a digital format. This year, MOT has included the Hall of Fame award as well.

Prahlad Singh Patel, Minister of State (I/C) for Tourism and Culture, Government of India, recently chaired a review meeting on eSamikSha platform with Ministry of Tourism officials. Also present were Arvind Singh, Secretary – Tourism and Rupinder Brar, Additional Director General – Tourism. eSamikSha is a digital governance platform for easy, instant and secure exchange of information. The portal has a flexi dashboard which provides officials the facility of customisation based on priority or requirements. It has a single-window communication channel linked with three layered robust tracking through Dashboard, Notification, email/SMS alerts.