Sharma, who is minister of state (independent charge) of tourism and culture and minister of state of civil aviation talked about a slew of initiatives planned by his ministry to realise the country’s available tourism potential, including tourist police, cleanliness and safety.
He said that three things needed to attract more tourists were “cleanliness, safety and hospitality.” He said the tourism ministry has embarked on ‘Swachh Bharat, Swachh Samarak’ (Clean India, Clean Monuments) to carry forward Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s clean India campaign.
According to Sharma India’s share in foreign tourist arrivals was far less compared to other Asian countries like China and Thailand. The government data for 2013 shows India’s share of international tourist arrivals was 0.64 percent. India ranked 42nd in world tourist arrivals and 16th in world tourism receipts.
He said memorials such as the Taj Mahal would have provision of e-ticketing by Jan 1 next year. He also revealed the plans to clean the most visited monuments in the next three months. Cleanliness will also be taken up at the partially-visited monuments followed by those monuments which were relatively unexplored.
Sharma said the ministry plans to increase “safety of international tourists” by providing them a toll free number which they can call on 24 X 7 and seek assistance.
“We propose to employ tourist police also. It is an important part of tourism,” he said and added that the ministry could create its own tourist police in the future.
“We propose to have a strong law so that no body touches the tourist or creates any problem,” he said and added that if a few people are penalised, the message will go across. Sharma said the proposal had been taken up with the Home Ministry.
The minister also favored construction of Jewar airport in Gautam Buddha Nagar, saying that it will help take the load off Palam airport and improve cargo business.
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