Gujarat is expecting a 15 per cent rise in tourist flow in the current financial year. “A total of 4.5 crore tourists, two per cent of them foreigners, visited Gujarat in the last fiscal (FY2016-17). It is expected that tourist arrivals into the state will be 15 per cent more this fiscal,”said Jenu Devan, managing director, Tourism Corporation of Gujarat (TCGL).
Declaration of Ahmedabad as India’s first world heritage city by UNESCO will help in attracting more international tourists to the state, Devan said. To a query, Devan said the Goods and Services Tax (GST) has not adversely affected the tourism industry in his state. “We haven’t come across any adverse impact of the new tax regime to the Gujarat tourism sector so far.”