Mumbai, Oct 27: The Ministry of Shipping and the Department of Culture have joined hands to offer cruise tourism by setting up circuit ports along the East and West Coast, bringing in the much-awaited ''cruism'' culture to the country. The shipping ministry has already constituted a committee headed by Mumbai port chairperson Rani Jadhav to look into the marketing and infrastructure facilities for promoting cruise tourism.
Currently, cruise tourism in India is limited to the backwaters of Kerala despite the country having a coastline of 7,000 km.
It is learnt that the tourism department will share the expenditure for building cruise infrastructure at the port premises. Tourism joint secretary Amitabh Kant, while addressing a cruise tourism seminar organised by the Mumbai port here, had announced the government scheme to fund projects for infrastructure creation to meet the viability gap.
In November, the port-tourism team will also offer a variety of tourist packages to leisure travellers.
Cruise tourism has been identified as a thrust area by the government. It is creating a cruise circuit of five ports – Mumbai port (Maharashtra), Murmagoa port (Goa), New Mangalore port (Karnataka), Kochi port (Kerala) on the West Coast and the Tuticorin port on the East Coast, Union Minister for Shipping Shatrughan Sinha said. India is the seventh most preferred tourist destination and the trend reveals that the number of Indians going in for leisure travel is shooting up. According to Ms Jadhav, 26,000 Indians opted for the international cruise major star cruise for leisure travel during the last year. The passenger base of India was around 30,000 in 2002 and it is expected to go up, she said.
The global cruism industry is growing at 80 per cent annually, which is higher than world tourism. The worldwide revenue on this is calculated at 14 billion dollar.
Cruise shipping, hit hard by September 11, 2001 attacks and the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) saw a dramatic fall in booking, but is now poised for recovery with new destinations and routes. The fleet size and number of passengers are expected to double in ten years, she said.
Ms Jadhav said, ''Already eight cruise liners had called at Mumbai port and more cruise liners are expected this fiscal.''
The Mumbai port has a dedicated passenger berth and temporary facilities for immigration and other formalities, she added. Bureau Report