Ladakh Festival concludes
Excelsior Correspondent
LEH, Sept 4: Union Minister Prahlad Singh Patel has assured to reconsider Swadesh Darshan and urged the officers to review the projects and submit proposals on priority basis.
He also mentioned about introducing B&B services in Ladakh with the aim to promote home stay and also to take up the matter of Heli Tourism involving private investors.
Minister of State (MoS) Tourism (Independent Charge) stated this while chairing the meeting of LAHDC, here. CEC, Gyal P Wangyal, Deputy Chairman, LAHDC, Leh Tsering Sandup, Executive Councilors, Former MLC Chering Dorjey, DG, Ministry of Tourism Meenakshi Sharma, ADG, MoT, GoI Rupinder Brar, Div Com Ladakh Saugat Biswas, DC Leh Sachin Kumar and DC Kargil Baseer-ul-Haq Choudhary also attended the meeting.
The Minister informed the meeting about Adopt the Heritage Scheme and urged the Hill Council and Administration to plan long term, sustainable and locally viable projects. He gave assurance to consider all the demands and look for possible ways to address it under his capacity.
The Minister informed about newly launched Tourist Facilitator Programme (TFP) by Centre Government. He said that the objective of this online programme is to promote tourism with the involvement of local youth providing them with online certified basic course and advance courses in Heritage and Adventure tourism and spoken languages.
He urged Hill Council to encourage the local youth with a qualification of 10+2 to apply for these courses for which the registration has already started and take maximum benefit of the programme. He instructed the Administrative officers of Leh and Kargil to submit drafts and proposal of the demands at the earliest possible. He suggested to start with a tourist care centre on one route initially to see the usage and success provided with all kind of facilities within one premise.
Earlier, CEC, Gyal P Wangyal made brief presentation on the demands of LAHDC Leh.
Deputy Chairman under Culture and Tourism sectors put forth important demands for both Leh and Kargil. The demands includes cultural museum in Leh, Cultural Centre equipped with library, auditorium, conference hall, film theatre, art gallery, art studios, Science centre, Observatory cum Planetarium, renovation/restoration of heritage sites of cultural and tourists interest and celebration of festivals in both Leh and Kargil. Under Tourism the demands made includes an Amphitheatre, Rock Art site development, way side tourist care centre, Mountaineering Institute and Skill Development to mention few.
Meanwhile, the four days Ladakh Festival concluded with glittering cultural glimpses. The concluding function was presided over by the Minister himself at Polo Ground today.
The Minister in his address said Ladakh festival has its own image and identity that I didn’t know about and the vibrant culture that the region has. “Simplicity, beauty and rich cultural heritage, everything Ladakh has and that is what is needed to have tourism flourishing, and hence Ladakh has tremendous scope for tourism,” he added.
A colourful cultural procession of artists representing different regions of Ladakh was taken out from Main Leh market to Polo-ground which was also joined by Union Minister Prahlad Singh Patel and other dignitaries.
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