Minister for Tourism Kadakampally Surendran is certain that the decision to keep tourism out of hartals would have a far-reaching impact on the State’s development.
“Soon, we can look forward to announcements by those sponsoring hartals that tourists are also exempted from it, along with hospitals, media, milk supply and other essential services. We cannot say ‘no’ to hartals. The assurance given by all political parties to the Chief Minister was that they would support all steps that the government would take to exempt tourism from hartals and that gives hope,” the Minister told The Hindu .
The government, he said, was aware of the negative image that the State had earned as a tourist destination on account of frequent hartals. While the inconveniences that tourists who land in Kerala are put through is in itself a matter of worry, the way violent incidents dent the State’s image is even more distressing. “Such incidents send out the message that Kerala is not safe for tourists, which is not true as can be seen from the several awards and laurels that we have won internationally,” he pointed out.
The tourism sector provides jobs to 12 lakh persons, generates ₹33,000 crore in revenue and constitutes 9.73% of the State’s GDP. Over 1.5 crore tourists arrived in the State in 2017. The decision to rid tourist destinations of hartal has come at a time when Kerala Tourism is finalising the roadmap to increase foreign tourist arrivals by 100% and domestic tourists by 50% by 2020 and make rapid strides in Responsible Tourism, he said.
Mr. Surendran said the stakeholders had complained to the government about the hassles faced by tourists owing to frequent hartals and the government was also fully aware of the problems that hartals created to those trying to market various destinations and products in the State at international fairs, festivals and travel marts. “It is the responsibility of the government to give security and ensure safety of the tourists who arrive in the State for holidaying and that is what we trying to do with this decision,” Mr. Surendran said.
