Action Plan for Incredible India Bed & Breakfast and Home Stay Scheme

Incredible India was first launched in the year 2002 and it was an instant hit with 16% increase in tourists in the first year itself. The campaign was launched to establish India as a high end tourist destination.

In 2009 the Ministry of Tourism decided to expand the Incredible India campaign for the domestic tourists too. For this year the Ministry of Tourism has formulated an Action Plan for "Incredible India Bed & Breakfast and Home Stay Scheme".

The salient features of the Action Plan are as follows:

As Home Stay and Bed & Breakfast is the need of the hour, it was decided to revisit the scheme guidelines and update it based on present and future requirements.

To ensure expansion of Home Stay Scheme in State where it is already prevalent and introduction where it is not there.

Move towards ease of doing business through rationalisation of taxes, simplification of procedures etc.

Launch an aggressive marketing strategy to enlist more Bed & Breakfast establishments.

Involve online travel agents in promoting this scheme and bring it on the fast-track.

Groups were constituted to study various aspects of this scheme and submit recommendations in a time bound manner.

The Ministry of Tourism organised a Workshop on Incredible India Bed & Breakfast and Home Stay Scheme recently. The workshop was chaired by Secretary of Ministry of Tourism and was attended by officials from various State Governments, representatives from Hospitality and Travel Trade Industry, CEOs of online travel agents and officials of the Ministry of Tourism.

This workshop was conducted with the prime objective of meeting shortage of rooms in accommodation sector - specially the budget category.

As construction of hotels has a long gestation period, it was felt that the desired additional hotel capacity can be supplemented substantially by giving impetus to the Incredible India Bed & Breakfast Scheme of the Ministry of Tourism as well as similar schemes run by the State Governments and Online Travel Agents.