India is looking for increasing its cooperation with Egypt in tourism sector as the number of Indian tourists travelling to the country is going up due to a relaxed visa regime, the Indian envoy here has said.
India's Ambassador to Egypt Sanjay Bhattacharyya comments came during a brief session entitled 'Tourism in India', which was held in the Tagore Hall in the Indian Embassy in Cairo yesterday.
"We are looking for more cooperation between Egypt and India in the field of tourism," he said.
The session was aimed at boosting tourism between the two countries.
"If you ask for a tourism visa, you get it the next day," said the Ambassador, who also mentioned that he hopes Egypt will do the same.
The Ambassador said that number of Indian tourists coming to Egypt is going up, while the number of Egyptians going to India remains the same.
"Indian tourists have continued to come to Egypt through the last few years and the numbers have actually been going up, he said.
The session was attended by a group of Indian and Egyptian businessmen as well as representatives from the Egyptian tourism authority.
"Last year the number of Indian tourists to Egypt was increased by 27 per cent," Bhattacharyya said.
Bhattacharyya said there is a great recognition between both countries because Indian people study about Egypt, pharaohs, Pyramids and the ancient city of Luxor in their school life while Egyptians know about India from the Bollywood movies.
"Studying about Egypt at schools makes a lot of Indian tourists come to Egypt to see the sites they had learned about," he said.
Mahmoud Abdel Wahab, representative of the Egyptian Tourism Authority, said that both countries have rich experiences to offer to the tourists.
Abdel Wahab also urged the representatives of EgyptAir, who were attending the session, to start activating direct flights from Cairo to Delhi as the country's state-run airline has only direct flights from Cairo to Mumbai.
Two short movies on tourism in India were also screened during the session.
