The Hindu Business Line : Hospitality training programme unveiled in AP

ROLLING OUT RED CARPET: The Union Minister of State for Tourism, Ms Renuka Chowdhury, and the State Tourism Minister, Ms J. Geeta Reddy, get a traditional welcome at the launch of `Athiti Devo Bhavah', a national tourism campaign, in Hyderabad on Monday. - Mohammed Yousuf

Hyderabad , Jan. 24

AS part of a nation-wide hospitality campaignthe Union Minister of Tourism has unveiled the Athithi Devo Bhavah programme in Andhra Pradesh.

Taxi drivers, dhaba staffers, people manning petrol pumps and tourist guides will be trained in the art of hospitality to tourists. As many as 22,000 stakeholders will be given a six-month training. After this, they will be enrolled again for a reorientation programme.

"Athidi Devo Bhavah is an integral part of our culture. But we have lost touch with it. We need to pick that up again," Ms Renuka Chowdhury, Minister of State for Tourism, said.

Unveiling the five-year campaign here on Monday, she said the initiative had a seven-point agenda. Sensitisation, training, motivation and creation of awareness are some of the important elements. The initiative is part of the ministry's plan to double foreign arrivals to seven million.

Regretting the absence of a capacity building exercise to develop tourist-friendly attitudes, Ms Chowdhury said the efforts to promote tourism in the country had not matched the tourist inflows.

The national campaign will be rolled out in phases in the next three years. New Delhi, Mumbai, Jaipur, Agra, Goa and Aurangabad will be covered in the first phase.

The Government is also promoting circuits, covering several aspects of tourism potential in the country. It is working on a Buddhist circuit.

Ms Chowdhury asked the corporate sector to chip in to promote tourism. It is time companies like Shantha Biotech and Satyam pay back and help develop tourism in the State.

Ms J. Geeta Reddy, Minister of Tourism and Sugar (Govt of AP), said the first in the series of the training programme was opened on Monday for over 60 taxi drivers.

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