Deccan Odyssey, the luxury train service of the Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation (MTDC), will now be operated by Cox & Kings Ltd (CKL), which has bagged the outsourcing contract for five years with scope for extension for another five years.
The deal included onetime payment of Rs.1.12 crore for the first year plus 2 per cent revenue sharing on variables. The payment to MTDC would increase from year to year, officials said.
CKL will fully takeover the operations of this train and provide integrated services, including sales, marketing, operations, on-board and off-board service to tourists, mostly foreigners. The first train service of the re-launched Deccan Odyssey will commence on October 4. CKL is planning to operate the train for nine months.
Deccan Odyssey was initially launched in 2004. Ten itineraries have been announced, including destinations in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Deccan and north India.
CKL officials said they would aggressively market this service internationally, more specifically in the U.K., America, France, Japan and Russia, to make the Deccan Odyssey experience a grand success. MTDC officials said the integrated approach by a partner unlike a vendor would help.
Long-term perspective“With a long-term perspective and to boost the luxury train business, we have selected CKL. With the new partners, we are expecting innovative ideas to flow,” Maharashtra Additional Chief Secretary Sumit Mullick said.
“Our priority is to maintain that quality standard of services and facilities. This association with CKL will assure the desired level of professionalism to manage services, which also need flexible itineraries suiting best to various demands of customers,” MTDC Managing Director Jagdish Patil said. “With Deccan Odyssey, we are getting a world of change in any tourism product,” said CKL Director (Special Projects) Arup Sen.
