NT NETWORK
PANAJI
Goa achieves yet another milestone at the National Tourism Awards (NTA) held in Delhi on Thursday bagging the prestigious National Tourism Award in the category of Comprehensive Development of Tourism (Rest of India) for the year 2016-17.
The award was presented by the Union Minister for Tourism, Alphons Kannanthanam and was received by Tourism Minister Manohar Ajgaonkar along with managing director of GTDC, Nikhil Desai.
This is the for the second time Goa has bagged this award, the NTA awards have been instituted since 1990 and presented to state governments/UTs and several other tourism bodies in recognition of their performance in the respective fields of travel, tourism, and hospitality encouraging healthy competition with an aim to promote tourism.
Goa’s selection for the award comes as a result of a well documented submission on the state’s achievements in tourism over the last six years which has achieved fruitful results in various sectors be it infrastructure development, commissioning of tourism projects, launching of tourism products and services, initiatives taken on safety and security, cleanliness and hygiene, policies, marketing and promotion, events and activities etc.
“It is truly an honour for Goa to receive such a prestigious award for the second year especially in the area of Comprehensive Development of Tourism. Over the last one year, I have been closely monitoring various aspects of tourism evelopment and it is noteworthy that a lot is being undertaken in the state towards overall development of tourism,” said Ajgaonkar expressing his happiness on receiving the award.
This is helping the state to attract more tourists as we have grown not only in numbers but in terms of infrastructure, initiatives of all kinds and strengthened measures for the safety of tourists and providing a clean environment, he added.
He lauded the efforts of all the stakeholders and the officials of the department including GTDC chairman Nilesh Cabral and expressed his gratitude towards all the help offered by Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar.