E-Paper
Government looks to boost tourism, holds key meets
Holograms will be installed at sites protected under the Archeological Survey of India with QR codes, that will carry information on the site’s history in foreign languages
As part of it’s 100-day vision, the union ministry of tourism is working on technological upgrades of holograms at protected sites for tourists as well as technically-endowed stickers for vendors and services affiliated to the ministry. Union tourism minister Prahlad Singh Patel said that in addition to that, the Centre is holding deliberations with international missions in to iron out issues faced by foreign tourists in India.
Holograms will be installed at sites protected under the Archeological Survey of India with QR codes, that will carry information on the site’s history in foreign languages, said Patel. Additionally, vendors and service providers accredited by the ministry will be given new stickers with holograms. These holograms will carry information about the service-provider’s name, date of engagement and its expiry, and the kind of service provided. The move, officials said, was to bring in greater transparency and to stop such services from making wrongful claims of an affiliation with the ministry.
Patel said that the ministry is now holding meetings with missions from over nine countries from where tourism footfall is the most to find out what are the problems tourists from these countries face the most. As a consequence of these deliberations, the ministry is calling for a meeting of all tourism secretaries from the states in Delhi on August 20.
Patel said that the ministry is exploring a system where a foreign tourist’s phone automatically has numbers to emergency services in the region. “It could be an app or perhaps a system where the tourist’s phone is updated with emergency services numbers,” said the minister.
A tourism ministry official said that some of the diplomats point at the lack of access to a nodal officer. “We are now working on a system where the Sub-Divisional Magistrate is appointed as a nodal officer for tourists to reach out to,” said the official.
With the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) allowing for only one monument per country in its World Heritage list, the Centre will now attempt to ensure that more monuments make their entry in the temporary list. “Any monument needs to be on the temporary list for a year to be considered for the World Heritage list. In India, we have 90 monuments which qualify for the temporary list,” said Patel. Currently, India has 38 monuments on the UNESCO list.
