Kerala Tourism is trying out a new experiment for the overall monitoring, timely and speedy completion of various tourism projects executed with the budgetary support from the State and Centre.
The new mechanism is also aimed at preventing cost escalation on account of dragging of the work and to ensure quality. Official sources told The Hindu that the department was not happy with agencies such as KITCO and SIDCO that were executing the works.
The Centre’s insistence on repaying the sanctioned funds for key tourism projects that were not completed in the stipulated period also paid the way for strengthening of the monitoring of the projects. The tourism department which is yet to have an engineering wing of its own has been depending on persons provided by LBS to monitor the projects in the 14 districts. The department executes projects worth Rs. 250 crore annually and there are more than 325 tourism projects ‘live’ across the State.
