The Government of Uttarakhand recently appointed Madan Kaushik as the new state Tourism Minister. He succeeds Prakash Pant who is now the Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, Government of Uttarakhand. Kaushik is also responsible for other government portfolios such as Excise, Sugarcane and Urban Development. In a bid to further promote Rural Tourism in the state, the Uttarakhand Tourism Development Board (UTDB) has identified 28 villages in the state. UTDB is expecting financial support from the Ministry of Tourism (MoT) for developing basic amenities and Human Resource Development (HRD) in these villages, under Government of India’s (GoI’s) Rural Tourism scheme. However, names of these villages were not disclosed due to government policy. This information was divulged by A K Singh, Joint Director, UTDB.
Last year, UTDB identified 11 villages in the state under the Rural Tourism scheme of GoI, few of them include Chhota Kailash, Mana, Indroli, Padampuri. GoI funded Rs 50 lakh to each village for developing basic amenities like drinking water, roads, electricity and Rs 20 lakh for HRD such as training manpower |