Budget 2020: Tourism sector gets ₹2,500 Crore; 5 iconic sites to see infrastructural development

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Budget 2020: Tourism sector gets ₹2,500 Crore; 5 iconic sites to see infrastructural development

Budget 2020: Tourism plays a vital role in boosting the economy of any country. For a surge in tourism, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday proposed to allocate ₹2,500 Crore to the sector in the financial year 2020-21. Besides tourism, the allocation of Rs 3,150 crore for the Ministry of Culture was also announced.

According to the Economic Survey 2019-20, the growth of foreign tourist arrivals to India slowed down to 2.7 per cent in the January-October period of 2019 in tune with the global trend. So the increase in budget allocation is a welcoming measure from the government.

Apart from that, the Finance Minister proposed to establish the first Indian Institute of Heritage and Conservation with the status of a deemed university to operate under the Ministry of Culture.

While presenting the union budget, Sitharaman said, "Acquisition of knowledge in disciplines such as museology and archeology are essential for collecting and analyzing scientific evidence of such findings and for dissemination through high-quality museums."

"India had moved up from rank 65 in 2014 to 34 in 2019 in the Travel & Tourism Competitive Index (World Economic Forum). Foreign Exchange earnings grew 7.4% to Rs 1.88 lakh crores for the period January 2019 from Rs 1.75 lakh crores," the finance minister informed the parliament.

In a major bid to revitalize tourism, Sitharaman proposed 8 new museums, which include building infrastructure around 5 Iconic Sites, besides proposing renovation of 5 major museums across the length and breadth of India.

The government has selected five Archeological sites that are to be set-up or developed as Iconic Sites with on-site Museums at the following locations. These sites are: