As China opened its first tourist office in India on Monday, India’s plan for tourist office in China seems to be stuck owing to differences within the Government. India and China had launched the Year of Friendship through Tourism in February this year, as a follow-up to the joint-declaration made during Chinese President Hu Jintao’s visit to India in November last year. Among other things, the programme had envisaged opening of tourist offices in each other’s country. India was scheduled to open its office in June and the Tourism Ministry had chosen Shanghai for this purpose. However, highly places sources said the choice of the city was not acceptable to the Ministry of External Affairs. Sources said the MEA was of the view that Shanghai would not be able to serve the purpose effectively and wanted the office to be located in Beijing instead. The matter is yet to be sorted out and India is losing out on time to woo a big market, especially in view of the 2010 Commonwealth Games. As pointed out by Tourism Minister Ambika Soni on Monday, India and China are among the fastest growing outbound destinations in the world. It has also been observed that an overwhelming majority of tourists from Asia travel within the region, which makes both India and China big tourist destinations. Speaking at the inaugural function of the Chinese office, Chairman of the National Tourism Administration of China Shao Qiwei said he was looking forward to hosting Indian tourists during the Olympics and the World Expo in Shanghai. He hoped that the Chinese office in India would further promote bilateral ties between the two countries. Qiwei is leading a high-level tourism delegation from his country which will participate in a series of events in New Delhi and Mumbai. Earlier in the day, a meeting of India-China Tourism Forum was held to exchange information for future cooperation in the tourism sector between the two countries.
