AP to begin cruise tourism in port city: Minister

Chennai, Nov 7: The Andhra Pradesh Government has signed a MoU with IL& FS recently to start cruise tourism in Visakhapatnam connecting it with Andaman, Kanniyakumari and Sri Lanka, State Tourism Minister J Geetha Reddy today said.

Addressing the inaugural session of one-day seminar on Air Connectivity organised by the Air Travellers Association of India (ATA), Dr Reddy made a fervent appeal to managements of local hotel chains to set up beach resorts at Visakhapatnam as the new tourism policy of her government offered many concessions and condusive atmosphere for public private partnership.

She said Andhra Pradesh was attracting 9.5 crore domestic and half a million foreign tourists every year.

As part of the tourim promotion activities, it was proposed to illuminate the million-year-old Borra Cave (Arakku Valley).

A green valley train linking Arakku Valley with Visakhapatnam will soon be commissioned with the help of Union Tourism Ministry to attract more visitors.

The Andhra Pradesh Government had earmarked Rs 85 crore for tourism in the current year's budget as against Rs one crore in the 80s.

Since the state was well known for Budhist culture, efforts were on to develop the state as Buddhist Centre.

In his address, Andhra Pradesh Commercial Taxes Minister said the only handicap in developing the Visakhapatnam region was lack of proper air connectivity.

To remove this lacunae, the government was taking efforts to upgrade the airport there to an international standard.

The ongoing Rs 300 crore expansion project of the Visakhapatnam Airport is expected to be completed by next month.

Former Andhra Pradesh Minister and Member of Parliament representing Visakhapatnam in the Lok Sabha, Mr N Janardhana Reddy said the Visakhapatnam City and its surroundings had many industries both in private and public sectors and many of them were presently launching huge expansion plans. The public sector HPCL is implementing a new grassroot refinery in the Special Economic Zone at Atchutapuram at an investment of Rs 30,000 crore.

The Union Shipping Ministry had agreed to sanction Rs 700 crore as revival package for Hindustan Ship Yard. The Andhra Pradesh Government has already agreed to contribute Rs 55 crore as its share.

A naval base cum school was coming up near Visakhapatnam on 5,000 acre site at an investment of Rs 6,000 crore.

A 1,000 acre apparel park was being established by Apparel Giant Brandix at Visakhapatnam for which Congress President Sonia Gandhi was likely to lay the foundation stone on November 25.

All these developmental activities made Prime Minister Manmohan Singh remark he would like Visakhapatnam to be the jewel of India on the East Coast.

In his address, ATA President D Varada Reddy said the ongoing Rs 300 crore development-cum-expansion work at Vishakapatnam Airport is in full swing and the extension of runway from the present 6,500 feet to 10,000 feet is expected to be complete by next month.

Apart from the runway extension work, the Vizag Airport would get night landing and instrument landing facility simultaneously.

He said once the extension work of the runway was completed, the Vizag Airport would be in a position to handle bigger aircrafts likely Airbus 320 and Boeing 767.

A road show was also organised with an aim of showing the strengths of the North Coastal Andhra Pradesh in industry, IT, education, natural resources and tourism in East Godavari, Vizag, Vizianagaram, Srikakulam and other places.

UNI