KAHINI CHAKRABORTY – Mumbai
The Indian Association of Tour Operators (IATO) is going to kick start today its 28th annual convention in Mumbai. Coming back to Maharashtra after 20 years, the association is confident that the state’s foreign tourist arrivals will increase by 15-25 per cent in the next 18-24 months post their convention this year. The theme of the convention is ‘Moving forward in challenging times-together’. The convention will be inaugurated by chief guest Prithviraj Chavan, chief minister, Maharashtra and Chhagan Bhujbal, minister of Tourism, government of Maharashtra will be the guest of honour.
Talking at the press conference held yesterday at Trident, Nariman Point, Mumbai, the venue of the association’s convention this year, Rajeev Kohli, convention chairman (also vice president), IATO said, “Maharashtra as a destination has lots to offer and we decide which city goes into what programmes and therefore are in a unique position to shape the positioning of the destination in the global travel market. As a result of holding our convention in Mumbai, we would like to project an increase of 15-25 per cent of foreign tourist arrivals in the next 18-24 months into the state.”
Elaborating on Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation (MTDC)’s tourism development plan, Dr Jagdish Patil, MD, MTDC informed that 25 Buddhist sites have been identified and finalised for development of Buddhist circuits. The corporation is preparing a programme to develop them and the first circuit will be developed on Mumbai-Nagpur-Bhadra. For the same, the corporation has received INR 10 crore sanction from the central government and additional INR 10 crore from the state culture department for restoration purpose. Apart from this, corporation has also identified four fort circuits and have identified 25 forts for restoration. The first circuit will be developed by March 2013. Also five resorts of MTDC will incorporate green power and if successful it would be adopted in other MTDC properties as well in future. “Through this association with IATO we are looking forward to promoting Maharashtra’s tourism offerings in a huge way as we feel that the role of tour operators is important for attracting more number of tourists,” added Patil.
