IACC asks govt to facilitate balanced tourism growth

New Delhi, Feb 9 (UNI) The Indo-American Chamber of Commerce (IACC) has recommended to the Centre to bring tourism in the concurrent list of the constitution for the orderly growth of the sector in the country.

According to industry estimates, over 4.43 million foreign tourists visited India last year, up 13 per cent from 3.92 million in 2005, creating a total demand of about 53.5 billion dollars of the total economic activity in the country. This accounted for nearly 5.3 per cent of the GDP.

The foreign exchange earnings from tourism grew to 6.57 billion dollars in 2006, an increase of 14.6 per cent from 2005.

But, this growth was not spread over the entire country and instead was limited to a few regions -- north, south and Rajasthan in the western India.

''Arbitrary and ad-hoc imposition of levies by some state governments have stifled the tourism growth. It has also created, among the states front runners and laggards in tourism development,'' IACC pointed out.

The chamber suggested, the Central government needs to take more initiatives in conjunction with the state governments, such as setting aside more funds for tourism development through budgetary allocations and making legislations that promote tourism.

''Equally significant is granting infrastructure status to the hotels so that they can tap resources for construction and modernisation in a much easier manner,'' it said.

The chamber also said the proposal of the Civil Aviation Ministry to link over 100 air strips across the country with main airports should be implemented at the earliest to provide easy entry and exit point to tourists in the country.

UNI