Centre urges NE to upgrade tourist hospitality

Agartala, Aug 3 (UNI) The DoNER Ministry has urged the Northeastern states to upgrade facilities to promote tourism in the region.

The Ministry has also assured to support the development of infrastructure in the North-East.

DoNER officials here today said that the Centre had already modified the LTC Rules for the next two years and thrown open a large pool of potential travellers comprising 30 lakh Central government employees and about 17 lakh PSU employees in the country. The officials stated that the Centre had already allocated huge funds for the development of tourism sites in the region but expressed concern over the internal facilities, including hotels, transportation and amusement, describing them unsatisfactory in these states, which sometimes disappointed the tourists.

As part of the mission, the DoNER Ministry, in collaboration with North Eastern Development Finance Corporation Limited (NEDFi), had organised a workshop in Guwahati with government officials, tour operators, NGOs and bank officials with a view to boost the tourism potential of the region, the officials said.

They pointed out that the workshop was aimed to upgrade the knowledge base and enhance the exposure to the service providers.

Former Regional Director, India Tourism Office, Frankfurt, Germany and NEDFi sitting Consultant for the promotion of Tourism in North-East P K Dong addressed the workshop.

''The Region should formulate and roll out an integrated regional tourism development and road-map to cash in on its amazing diversity in the form of wildlife, landscape, culture and heritage,'' the officials underlined.

To boost the tourism in the region, the NEDFi and DoNER would provide Platinum Sponsorship to four days Indian Tour and Travel Operators (IATO) Convention 2008 to begin on August 7 at Bhubaneswar where about 5,000 travel and tour operators from India and abroad will participate, they said, adding that the Platinum Sponsorship will provide a special focus to NE Tourism at the Convention to create awareness about the tourist destinations.

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