With insurgency gradually fading in the Northeast, New Delhi wants to go in for an aggressive marketing of this region as a major tourist destination across the globe with the Ministry of Tourism getting around 85 buyers from 23 countries to participate in the International Tourism Mart which started here on Friday.
“People outside do not know much about the wonderful places and the diverse culture of the Northeastern states. But with whatever effort we have made in the past few years,
foreign tourist arrival in the Northeast has already gone up by about 18 per cent in the past two years. This International Tourism Mart, one which has never taken place before at such a large scale, intends to boost the Northeast in a big way,” Parvez Dewan, Union Tourism Secretary said here on Friday.
Besides highlighting the Northeastern states, the tourism mart is also focusing on West Bengal tourism.