the goan I network
PANAJI
The journey to Gujarat is a journey into its amazing 3500 years of history. Cashing in on state’s natural and cultural delights, fairs, festivals, temples and holy shrines, the government of Gujarat has been concentrating on developing tourism and inviting international tourist footfalls.
“Emerging as a favourite destination on the international tourist map, Gujarat claims to be third state in India that attracts domestic as well as foreign tourists. But this was not so a decade ago. It was nowhere on the world tourism map a decade ago, hardly had Rs 40 crore budget allocated to it to develop tourism. However, today our budget is Rs 550 crore and our state is developing speedily as world tourist destination. In 2004 around 60 lakh tourists visited Gujarat but the figure has crossed 5 crore now. The credit for this tremendous transformation goes to the Narendra Modi government, which focused has helped us change the scenario. We saw a deficit of Rs 46 crore a decade ago but we successfully brought the state out of deficit and today Gujarat Tourism is in profit, of Rs 90 crore,” stated Kamlesh Patel, chairman, Gujarat Tourism while in Panaji.
Patel was in Goa to brief on the ninth Saputara Monsoon Festival that began on August 4 in Dang district of Gujarat in the densely wooded hills of the Sahyadris. A part of Gujarat’s only mountainous region, Saputara has emerged as one of the state’s major tourist destinations.
The two-month-long Saputara festival which will conclude on September 3 is organised each year by the Gujarat Tourism in order to encourage tourism, promote Saputara as a hill resort destination and create awareness about its many natural and cultural attractions.
“We have spent Rs 110 crore on the development of infrastructural facilities in this beautiful place and have since witnessed that the flow of the tourists goes up phenomenally every year during the monsoons,” said Patel. He noted that during 2015-16 over 2.5 lakh tourists visited this festival which generated revenue of Rs 13.19 crore for the local economy and people.
Speaking on the progress that the state made in tourism sector during his 10-year tenure as the chairman of Gujarat Tourism, Patel admitted that earlier Gujarat had its identity as a state of festivals and fervour, and as a business hub, but it was during the tenure of Narendra Modi government and the current chief minister Vijay Rupani that the state got an international status and identity as a tourist destination.
“We have utilised the budget well and this is being translated into our revenue. Saputara Monsoon Festival will be followed by other prominent celebrations of Gujarat Tourism in the coming months. Tarnetar Fair, a celebration of ethnic Gujarat’s folk-dance, music, costumes and the arts, centered around tribal men and women seeking marriage partners, will be held between September 12-15 in Surendranagar.
Navratri will be celebrated between October 10-18 in the whole of Gujarat, while Rann of Kutch that begins in Bhuj on November 1 will stretch till February 20, 2019 and kite festival (Uttarayan) is celebrated every year on January 14 wherein international kite festival will be held during January 6-14, 2019. “Divided into eight hubs - Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Surat, Rajkot, Jamnagar, Junagadh, North Gujarat and Kutch, the state of Gujarat is emerging as a tourist destination for all ages and there has been 17 per cent growth in tourism this year compared to the 13.5 per cent in the last five years,” briefed Sanatan Pancholi, manager, Gujarat Tourism.
