‘Incredible India brand to shine on craftsmen’

India may have been ‘‘Incredible’’ but it wasn’t ‘‘Shining’’. But the Tourism Department’s...

India may have been ‘‘Incredible’’ but it wasn’t ‘‘Shining’’. But the Tourism Department’s media campaign scored internationally. Now, the new Tourism Minister Renuka Chowdhury is trying to kill two birds with one stone. ‘‘Incredible India’’, the online and electronic media campaign aimed at pulling tourists, is now acquiring a tangible form. The Minister is identifying 2,000 handicraft items to be sold as souvenirs under the Incredible India brand. If the idea clicks, it will provide an assured market to thousands of village craftsmen and the tourism industry will support far more than the 42 million Indians it does today!

According to the plan, the ITDC-owned Ashoka Hotel in New Delhi will stock the first batch of 200 such items in the next six months. These will later be rolled out to 13 other ITDC hotels and at the 30-odd airport duty-free shops.

Multiple outlets will stock thousands of aromatherapy oils, Himalayan water, hand and body lotions, hand-made soaps and the like. The prospective clientele? Well, last year, 2.8 m travellers came to India. The Tourism Ministry expects to hit the four million mark this year. And we haven’t even factored in the 550 m domestic tourists, each of whom spends an average of Rs 1,389 per trip, according to the National Council of Applied Economic Research. Jaya Jaitley, the lady credited with the Dilli Haat, says: ‘‘Craft-related tourism will bring the market to the craftsman’s doorstep.’’ Along with a team of 1,500 craftsmen of the Dastkaari Haat Samiti, Jaitley herself develops souvenirs for Haryana tourism.

Deputy Development Commissioner Sandeep Srivastava is particularly gung ho about the employment potential. ‘‘The number of people employed in the handicraft sector will double,’’ he says.

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