Bengal plans tourism ad blitz

The West Bengal government's tourism department has lined up a publicity and promotion blitz and doubled its publicity and promotion budget to get more visitors to the state.

The funds would be used for advertisements in the electronic media, said West Bengal's principal secretary for tourism, Tapan K Burman.

"The state will double the publicity and promotion budget from the last year's Rs 70 lakh, of which around Rs 25 lakh was spend on advertisement,' said Burman.

The department would soon launch a 'tea tourism' package under which cottages in tea gardens and related tourism infrastructure would be upgraded to receive visitors.

The department would be hosting the West Bengal Tourism Festival at Nalban Boating Complex on the outskirts of Kolkata between April 15 and 19, with the ministry of tourism of the government of India (GoI) and West Bengal Forest Development Corporation Limited (WBFDCL) as associated agencies.

Tourism in the Sundarbans would be developed on the advice of the Planning Commission, which had has set up a committee to develop a model for ecologically sustainable tourism in the region, R K Tripathy, principal secretary of the West Bengal forest department said.