Tag: KJ Alphons

In a first, the government has come out with refined safety and quality guidelines for ‘adventure tourism’ on India. The guidelines set in discussion with the Adventure Tour Operators Association of India (ATOAI) covers 15 land-based, 7 air-based and 7 water-based activities. The guidelines consists of minimum standards required for activities like mountaineering, trekking, bungee jumping, paragliding, kayaking, scuba diving, snorkeling, river rafting etc. The guidelines also instruct that all tour operators must be recognised by local or state authorities, have a registered office, responsible to nature, employ trained and skilled professionals. It includes subjects like the role of a ... Read more

The Sikkim government and tourism stakeholders of Himalayan state has wholeheartedly welcomed the Union tourism ministry’s proposal to lift the restrictions on foreign tourists who loves to travel to Arunachal Pradesh and parts of Sikkim. Union Tourism Minister KJ Alphons and his ministry proposed the plan when they had a meeting with senior Union home and defence ministry officers last week. The restriction will be lifted only if the home and defence minister give nod to the plan. For travelling in some parts of the Sikkim, the foreigners need to apply for travel documents such as the protected area permit ... Read more

The tourism ministry plans to accelerate India’s booming tourism sector by the introduction of long-term visas, which will increase the international tourist inflow significantly. The international tourist arrivals to India increased by 15.7 per cent in 2017 to top 10 million. The ministry also plans to ease travel restrictions in some areas, introduce more flights to trendy tourist destinations for boosting the international tourist arrivals. The tourism ministry had already proposed for better air connectivity to places like Khajuraho, Aurangabad, Ahmedabad, Srinagar and Guwahati to the civil aviation ministry last week. The ministry of home affairs has already accepted tourism ... Read more

India’s booming tourism industry is aided by the transportation services in a great way. A meeting was held between Union Tourism Minister K.J. Alphons, Minister of Civil Aviation Suresh Prabhu and Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayanta Sinha, along with the officials of both ministries for creating better air connectivity of tourist destinations in order to heighten the tourism sector. The Ministry of Civil Aviation agreed to take immediate action regarding better connectivity after discussion with the air operators. The ministry also decided to widen the UDAN scheme to all the undeserved destinations at the earliest. The decisions also ... Read more

India is not just depending on the foreign tourist arrivals, close to 24 million Indians travelled last year. “In 2017, 1.8 million trips were made by Indians within the country and which will go up to 2 million in 2018 and we want this number to increase dramatically, its not just about international arrivals but also Indians visiting India,” Tourism Minister K J Alphons said while interacting to the travel/tour operators in a Q&A session at the ITB Berlin. The minister also stressed on the growing use of new technologies and methodologies in tourism, especially social media. Alphons also spoke ... Read more

It’s that time of the year for the travel and tourism industry players and professionals from every nook and corner of the world to hurry to the German capital of Berlin to participate in their dream get-together organised by Messe Berlin GmbH. The platform for this meeting is none other than the much talked about Internationale Tourismus-Börse Berlin (ITB Berlin), world’s largest tourism trade fair. As usual, this year too the event is attracting hundreds of thousands of exhibitors and participants. Around 10,000 tourism companies from 186 countries and regions are represented on an area covering 160,000-sq-m at the Messe ... Read more

The silver jubilee edition of SATTE, South Asia’s leading travel and tourism exhibition, kick starts at the Le Meridien in New Delhi. THe evnt was inaugurated by Chief Guest KJ Alphons, Minister for Tourism (I/C), Govt. of India, along with TS Rawat, Chief Minister, Uttarakhand;  Amitabh Kant, CEO, NITI Aayog; Faiyaz Koya, Minister for Industry, Trade and Tourism Fiji; I Gde Pitana Dy. Tourism Minister, Indonesia;  Bo Keun Choi, Senior Officer, Regional Programme for Asia and the Pacific, UNWTO; Subhash Goyal, Member, National Tourism Advisory Committee; Navin Berry, Founder, SATTE; Michael Duck, Executive Vice President, UBM Asia and Yogesh Mudras, Managing ... Read more