TravTalk India Online Magazine
Arvind Singh, Secretary, Tourism, Government of India, has claimed that the closing of overseas India tourism offices will not be the end of an era, but a new beginning for the country’s marketing prowess, led by the National Tourism Board, and by the Indian missions.
Nisha Verma & Janice Alyosius
Speaking at the recent PATA India seminar, Arvind Singh, Secretary, Tourism, Government of India, shared that the country is witnessing a huge upsurge and robust growth in the domestic tourism sector. For inbound, he said that a finding by NCAR has revealed that even though the UNWTO expects inbound to be at 65 per cent globally, figures for India will be better than the prediction for the rest of the world. “We expect that given the activities that we have in the country, which includes the G20 Presidency, will be giving a big fillip to inbound tourism. All the state governments and relevant agencies are working hard to showcase the best that India has to offer in terms of the G-20,” he said.
Events galore
Talking of G20, Singh revealed that for tourism, they are doing four working group meetings. “The first will be in the Rann of Kachchh from 7 to 9 February. The second will be at Siliguri-Darjeeling in April, and for the third, we are deciding on the location somewhere in the hills in May. The last working group will be in Goa, which would be followed by the tourism ministers’ meeting in June. Apart from these, there will be side events. The Global Tourism Investors summit will be held in April at Pragati Maidan. Roadshows for that are already underway. There will be an adventure summit and a M!CE conference will be held at Bengaluru. There will be a business expo that FICCI is doing in Jaipur in April and the WTTC and UNWTO do the G20 ministerial summit—a Global CEO Conference, which they did in Bali when the G20 Presidency was with Indonesia. There will be a global CEO’s meeting during the ministerial meeting in Goa in June as well. Thus, from February onwards, till June, there will be a lot of action, in terms of the tourism working group meetings,” he said.
Overseas tourism offices
Singh informed that when the India tourism offices were established overseas in the pre-internet era, physical presence was paramount and hence a lot of money was spent on hiring location, recruiting people and doing physical events for distribution of material, literature, roadshows and doing physical events in those countries. “After a reassessment a few years back, the number of these offices was reduced from 14 to 8 crucial markets. There were reservations within the government of the efficacy or utility of these offices. Hence, finally after assessment at the committee of secretaries it was decided that we do away with all these offices, because given the changed circumstances, the growth of internet, in an era where people are digital nomads, there is no necessity to maintain such physical offices. Thus, it would be better to look or try different models that many countries have adopted,” he explained.
He further said, “MOT did a study with the help of Invest India and our consultants on National Tourism Board of India (NTBI), and the promotion strategy and the efficacy of these offices. It was felt that the MOT was not equipped to do the promotion work, and an external agency is needed, which would be nimble and housed with experts from the industry to do this kind of executive role. That is how the proposal to set up NTBI came, which will overlook all the overseas promotion and domestic promotion activities as the primary mandate. This will be housed by tourism officials, who are coming back from the countries and they will manage those regions, but will be based in New Delhi at NTBI. That is the mandate from the committee of secretaries, and we could hire talent from outside to run these boards, get representatives from industry and the budget for promotion would be placed with this board, which would manage the overseas and domestic promotion work, which is currently being done by the MOT.”
Singh revealed that the COVID period gave them time to rethink the strategies. “The idea to establish NTBI came and has found acceptance within the government. The offices, in such a situation, do not have any utility. If any physical work would be required, the officers at the 20 missions could do it. More such officers can be designated in future. Under the Prime Minister’s order, now the missions are being monitored by the MEA on the promotion of Trade Technology and Tourism—the 3Ts. The officers have devised strategy papers for that. Secondly, there would be market representatives, or private agencies, which will be selected through a transparent bidding process. We have already identified the markets, where we would place these market representative agencies,” he said.
He elaborated, “Moving ahead, the role of the missions and the officers will be replaced by the NTBI, which would overall see the campaign in the different regions, as well as study the trends. Work through the Indian missions abroad in crucial markets and through the private agencies would be placed and selected through an open bidding process. We have done all the thinking, paperwork and the groundwork. We presented this to the PM in May 2022, and he asked the cabinet secretary to go through it, which was done in August 2022. We have his in-principle nod to set up the NTBI and to restructure our media strategy. Further processes of getting the Finance Ministry’s approval and the Cabinet’s approval is underway. Our notes to the finance ministry in the cabinet are virtually ready and we are just waiting for the dates for the meeting.”
