The Hindu : Jagmohan policy to attract tourists

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jan 14, 2003

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National

Jagmohan policy to attract tourists

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI JAN. 13. The Union Minister for Culture and Tourism, Jagmohan, has adopted a carrot and stick policy to clear monuments across the country of encroachments as part of his "holistic'' approach to turning India into a major tourist destination. All State Governments have been told that they would not be provided Central funds for projects unless they cleared the monuments within their jurisdiction of encroachments. Madhya Pradesh was recently denied financial assistance for the Tansen Festival because it had failed to clear his memorial of encroachments.

Mr. Jagmohan told presspersons here today that efforts were being made to put in place tourist friendly infrastructure in various monuments as the absence of civic facilities deterred many a tourist from heading towards India. Still, despite inadequate facilities, advisories issued by several countries against travelling to this part of the world, and the general security alert, India had registered a 16 per cent increase in foreign tourist arrivals in the last three months of 2002 over the corresponding time in the previous year. Domestic tourism had also seen an upward swing to the tune of 24 per cent.

As many as 7,36,859 tourists came to India between October-December 2002 compared to 6,45,834 during the corresponding period in 2001. The total foreign exchange earning between January and November 2002 was $ 2,811.11 million (Rs. 13, 643.81 crores) against $ 3,042 million (Rs. 14, 344 crores) for the same period in 2001.

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