Tamil Nadu - Nagercoil   

Plan to introduce rope car facility in Kanyakumari

Staff Reporter

Minister inaugurates National Tourism and Cultural Festival

Nagercoil: The Government has drawn up a plan to introduce rope car facility in Kanyakumari and Yercaud, said the Tourism Minister, A.Miller.

Inaugurating the National Tourism and Cultural Festival — 2006 at Kanyakumari on Sunday, he said that Tamilnadu Tourism Development Corporation (TTDC) has allotted Rs. 14.52 crore to carry out the rope car facility at Kodaikanal and Rs. 15.97 crore at Udagamandalam.

The Government has set up six tourism information centres in Ahmedabad, Chandigarh, Guwahati, Varanasi, Bhubaneswar and Agra. It has allotted Rs. 4.28 crore under Adi Sankarar and Vivekananda Tourism Ring Road Development Scheme.

The Department of Tourism has decided to develop infrastructure facility at Pamban, Viveka Bhaskaram, Agni Theertham, Ramar Patham, Jadayu Theertham and construct tourism information centre at Rameswaram and a cement path at Uthirakosamangai in Ramanathapuram district.

A sum of Rs. 48.68 lakh had been allotted for development of Kazugumalai, Rs. 50 lakh each for Chettinadu, Theerthamalai and Thirukurunkudi and Rs. 75.60 lakh for development of Devipattinam under Rural Tourism Development Project.

The Government had taken steps to develop `Navagraga' spots such as Chettinadu, Pazhaverkadu, Pichavaram and Tranquebar. Woks were going on to renovate sound-and-light show at Tirumalai Nayak Mahal in Madurai at a cost of Rs. 96.18 lakh. Similarly, sound-and-light show at an estimated cost of Rs. 2.25 crore and Rs. 1.50 crore would be implemented shortly at Kanyakumari and Thanjavur respectively.

The Government has allotted Rs. 53.50 crore for renovation of tsunami-hit tourism spots in coastal areas. It was keen to attract those who wanted to visit tourism spots by sea. They were being taken to Chennai city, Mamallapuram, Kanchipuram, Madurai and Tirunelveli and they were accorded traditional reception.

The Department of Tourism had launched a web site to enable tourists know about important tourism spots and other relevant information.

Online reservation was introduced on July 2, 2004 and the department had earned a sum of Rs. 32.13 lakh up to November, 2005 through online reservation.

The TTDC had introduced railway tourism to attract tourists from various parts of north India. It was successfully operating railway tourism from Kolkata, Mumbai, Delhi, Ahmedabad and Lucknow for the last four years. It had earned a sum of Rs. 2.21 crores in this regard. It had signed a memorandum of understanding with TDCs in other States to promote tourism there.

The Tourism Department has sent proposal at an outlay of Rs.5 crore to develop infrastructure facility at Thiruvannamalai and another one at an outlay of Rs. 4.98 crore to develop tourism spots in Yercaud. As many as 280 lakh domestic tourists and 10.58 foreign tourists visited the State in 2004 — an increase of 17 per cent compared to the situation in 2003.

Health Minister N.Thalavai Sundaram said that the Government has allotted Rs. 9.56 crore to promote tourism activities in the district. Works were going on for construction of a parking lot, tourism reception centre, cottages, tourist waiting shelter etc. on full swing and these would be completed at the earliest.

Similarly, the district administration has spent Rs. 4 crore to provide infrastructure facilities in various tsunami-hit tourism spots in the district.

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