By Ansoo Gupta, Founder, OneShoe Trust Imagine the world is back to normal, all borders are open, there’s no restrictions on travel any longer and people have flocked back to spend their leisure time at beautiful beaches, verdant valleys, and misty mountains. The whole travel ecosystem works in tandem to help these tourists get from their base to the destination they want to get to, creating value in the process for all the stakeholders. But when the tourists are standing at the beach with salty water splashing around their feet, do they stop to ponder who does the beach actually…
Author: Prasenjit Chakraborty
It seems a rose will not smell the same if called by another name. In India, a lot of barbs are thrown at ‘babus’ across the world. The unwieldy power that staid bureaucrats exert on hapless citizenry often throws up the implementation of the law or regulations in letter and not spirit. Unfortunately this babu-dom is universal. Covid has laid bare a host of inequities, false narratives and fault-lines in policies across the world resulting in unequal practices impacting travel opportunities. Having arrived in London just last week, these hiccups for me are just too evident to be ignored. The…
By Gargi Sarma, Assistant Professor in the Department of M.Com at K C Das Commerce College, Guwahati India’s Tourism & Hospitality Sector has won the precariousness of the growing dynamism and settled for an impressive growth since 2015. The Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report (Courtesy-World Economic Forum) flaunts the score hike achieved by the sector within 2017-2019 thereby, crowning India the ‘Major Tourist Destination’. This exponential hike was the result of an apt marketing strategy i.e. ‘Introducing the tourists to a number of exciting chapters of tourism and presenting travel ideas to the prospects with captivating advertising campaigns.’ However,…
Thomas Cook (India) Limited, and its Group Company, SOTC Travel Ltd., have signed a 3 year agreement with Air Arabia, the first and largest low-cost carrier (LCC) operator in the Middle East and North Africa. The partnership will deliver on a range of customisable air-inclusive holidays via a technology platform built by Thomas Cook India and SOTC. The holiday portfolio will be curated by Thomas Cook and SOTC, with air inventory and exclusive fares being provided by Air Arabia. The partnership expands Thomas Cook India & SOTC reach with access to Air Arabia’s customer base in India and provides marketing…
Serving food on flights with a duration of less than two hours can be resumed, the Union health ministry is learnt to have informed the civil aviation ministry after the latter sought inputs from it for amending the existing regulations. The health ministry has also said the crew members on a flight need not wear coveralls but should continue to wear gloves, masks and face shields, according to sources. Under the existing guidelines, airlines are not allowed to serve meals in flights that have a duration of less than two hours. The ban came into effect from April 15. When…
The Netherlands has entered a partial lockdown after a sharp increase in coronavirus infections. Shops, bars and restaurants will close early for three weeks, while crowds won’t be allowed at sporting events. The Netherlands is entering a partial lockdown after Covid-19 infections hit records last week, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said. “We have a very difficult message tonight combined with drastic measures,” Rutte said at a press conference in The Hague. The country will enter a partial lockdown with bars and restaurants that need to shut down effective from Saturday 8 p.m., Rutte added. Non-essential shops must close at…
Tourism Australia’s inaugural online Australia Global Summit is all set to take place on November 16, 2021. The event will deliver a program packed with inspiring keynote speakers, energising storytelling chapters, targeted and informative education sessions, and on-demand content. The travel professionals across India can attend the event free of cost. More than 2,000 travel professionals globally, including close to 500 members from India alone, have already registered for the event. Keynote speakers Dr Angus Hervey and Tané Hunter, the dynamic Future Crunch duo, whose mission is to foster intelligent, optimistic thinking about the future and to empower people to…
The Ministry of Tourism has signed an agreement with the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) as part of its ongoing efforts to strengthen the hospitality and tourism industry after the coronavirus pandemic left it in heavy losses. The objective of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), signed on November 10, is to provide an extensive visibility to accommodation units, which have self-certified themselves on SAATHI (System for Assessment, Awareness & Training for the Hospitality Industry) on the Online Travel Aggregator (OTA) platform, the ministry said in a statement. The Ministry of Tourism has already signed similar MoUs with EasyMyTrip,…
Global digital travel platform Agoda has launched its Indiagenous Travel Survey 2021 as a part of a campaign to drive domestic travel in India. The platform, found seventy-nine per cent of Indians’ have visited between two to 10 states, according to the survey, with more than half having visited two to five states. Agoda’s India-genous survey is launched as part of Agoda’s Indiagenous travel campaign that aims to showcase the diversity and beauty of India by partnering with influencers to create social and digital media content that shines a spotlight on great accommodation, food, art, heritage, and natural beauty spots…
According to a TOI report, anyone who has not taken even a single dose of COVID-19 vaccine will be denied entry at historic monuments and sites in Aurangabad district of Maharashtra. Referring to this, an official in the know how stated that District Collector Sunil Chava has passed the said orders, and the same have already been put into place. As per the orders, when the district administration found that the vaccination figures in the region were relatively low, it passed the said order. Now, as per the latest rules, at least one dose of vaccine is mandatory for those…
