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  India   Orissa fails to attract foreign tourists

Orissa fails to attract foreign tourists

Published : Sep 30, 2016, 1:47 am IST
Updated : Sep 30, 2016, 1:47 am IST

Despite having enough tourism potential in Orissa — that among others comprises the 480-km virgin coastline, gigantic architectural wonders like the Sun Temple, Konark, and Emperor Ashoka’s Peace Pago

orissa.jpg
 orissa.jpg

Despite having enough tourism potential in Orissa — that among others comprises the 480-km virgin coastline, gigantic architectural wonders like the Sun Temple, Konark, and Emperor Ashoka’s Peace Pagoda, Bhubaneswar, Bhitarkanika National Park in Kendrapara and heterogeneous primitive tribal communities living in southern districts — the number of foreign tourists visiting Orissa has dwindled in recent years.

According to government’s statistics, Orissa’s share in the total number of foreign tourists visiting India was only 0.83 per cent in 2015 while the rate was 0.93 per cent in 2014. In 2015, only 80, 27,133 foreign tourists visited India. However, only 66,971 of them came to Orissa.

The statistics placed by state culture and tourism minister Ashok Panda in the current session of the Assembly revealed that 66, 675 visitors from abroad toured various places in Orissa in 2013. The following year, 71,426 foreign nationals visited the state and 66,971 visited in 2015 — a drop of 4,455 tourists.

Despite several claims of the state government that “many foreign tourists would visit the state during the Nabakalabara festival in 2015”, only 3,000 came to the state.

However, the domestic visitors’ inflow to the state has increased by 9-10 per cent a year. Statistics reveal that 98 lakh domestic tourists visited the state in 2013 followed by 1.07 crore in 2014, amounting to an increase of 9 per cent annually.

In 2015, the figure was 1.17 crore. The minister told the Assembly that the state government was taking several steps to woo foreign tourists to Orissa.

“A number of festivals, clean beaches, roadshows, dance and music festivals are being organised to attract foreign tourists,” he said.

Sources said most foreign tourists visited the Sun Temple at Konark, Bhitarkanika National Park and tribal pockets in South Orissa.

Location: India, Odisha, Bhubaneswar