Virendra Singh Rawat / Lucknow
With the Lord Ram temple in Ayodhya fast nearing completion, marquee hotel and resort chains are making a beeline for the temple town.
So far, about 25 hospitality companies including hotels have already proposed to launch hotel and resort projects in Ayodhya, which is being positioned as a future global tourism hotspot.
According to UP principal secretary, tourism and culture, Mukesh Meshram, apart from the companies already registered with the online portal for their projects, an additional number of two dozen hospitality firms were likely to follow suit in the coming months.
Besides, Saryu cruise has also been proposed in Ayodhya and will be operationalised in the coming months.
The Yogi Adityanath government is vigourously pushing its UP Tourism Policy 2022 to ramp up tourism infra in Ayodhya and other prominent towns of religious, cultural and spiritual tourism interest.
The policy provides a host of incentives and subsidies to private investors including 25 percent capital subsidy on new projects to help the hospitality companies overcome the challenges of pandemic.
Meanwhile, the tourism department has planned to set up six gateways at the roads leading from other districts to Ayodhya. Six different roads lead to Ayodhya from Lucknow, Gorkahpur, Gonda, Ambedkarnagar etc.
Each of the gateway complexes will be named after popular characters from Ramayan and entail tourism facilities such as yoga centre, food court, dormitory etc.
Interestingly, some hotels are even confabulating with the erstwhile Ayodhya royal family to redevelop thier palaces into heritage properties to attract premium tourists.
According to reports, leading hospitality chains in the luxury and budget segments including Taj, Radisson, ITC, Oyo etc have proposed big projects in Ayodhya.
The tourist potential in Ayodhya is estimated to jump from 20 million in 2022 to 40 million within the next 10 years.
At present, there are only about one and half dozen hotels in Ayodhya with an inventory of nearly 600 rooms. Once the Ram temple is complete, the demand for good hotels will rise exponentially.
Moreover, the proposed Ayodhya international airport is expected to boost the tourist inflow with direct flights from other countries.
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Other key tourism projects such as light and sound show, wellness centres, Ayurved panchakarma centres, tent city, wayside amenities etc are also being launched.