CII to rope in IIM-Amritsar to chalk out plan to boost tourism

Vijay C Roy

Chandigarh, September 14

To push the tourism sector, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) would rope in IIM-Amritsar to prepare a tourism development plan for Amritsar. The city’s share in the state’s tourist footfall was 73 per cent in 2021.

With 1.98 crore tourists visiting Amritsar in 2021, the city needs a comprehensive tourism plan to push the sector to trigger economic boom in the state. Also, the state is at number seven in all states in foreign tourist arrivals.

“We are roping in IIM-Amritsar to prepare a tourism developmental plan for Amritsar as there is a dire need to improve tourism infrastructure and marketing,” said CII chairman Amit Thapar.

According to insiders, in addition to the Golden Temple, Jallianwala Bagh and Durgiana Temple, there were many heritage projects and places of tourist importance, which can further boost the sector.

With the new tourist destinations such as Sadda Pind, Heritage Street, War Memorial, Ram Tirath Complex and Partition Museum, the tourists have more places to visit in the city. There is a need for these places to be marketed to boost tourism. At present, tourists visiting the city hardly visit them due to lesser knowledge of these spots.

Also, for instance, Maharaja Ranjit Singh Panorama, which offers a visual documentation of the eventful life of the Maharaja, is unable to draw the attention of the tourists visiting the city in large numbers. So, there is a dire need for an action plan from the state Tourism Department. People associated with the tourism industry said the authorities had not been able to utilise the tourism potential of the city.

Besides infrastructure, the need of the hour is an aggressive publicity campaign to ensure that more tourists visit the city for at least a couple of days. There is a need to run a publicity campaign at a large scale, so that people in India and across the globe should know all places of tourism importance in Amritsar.