India has now entered into air bubble agreements with Iraq, Japan and Nigeria, taking the total count to 13 for countries it has established such agreements with. For Nigeria, seamen of foreign nationalities and seamen holding Indian passports will also be allowed subject to clearance from the Ministry of Shipping.

The International Ecotourism Society (TIES) has appointed Pankaj Nagpal, Managing Director, Travstarz Global Group, as the Chapter Head for North India. He is the first Chapter Head to be appointed in India by TIES which is a non-profit organisation present in 190 countries for sustainable and ecological preservation at global standards.

WTTC reveals that 100 destinations are now using its ‘Safe Travels’ stamp, with the Philippines becoming the official 100th destination to receive it. The stamp was developed in order to help restore confidence in travellers and work to revive an ailing travel & tourism sector, is now also being used by many more major holiday destinations such as the Maldives, Bermuda, Namibia, Uganda and Montenegro.

Mandeep S Lamba, President (South Asia), HVS ANAROCK, during a webinar, has advised hotel owners in India to not sell right now. “This is not a great time to sell. But if your cash flows are not holding out and you have no other way of managing it, then there is no option but to sell. Other than that, I would advise everybody to hold on because valuations will be a little depressed if you sell now. So the best advice I can give hotel owners is that if you have the ability to manage your cash flows for the next 12 months, then just hold on,” he advises.

The Principal Economic Advisor, Ministry of Finance, Sanjeev Sanyal, said during a webinar for FHRAI members, “We have, through the one-time loan restructuring option, offered to alleviate the financial burden on businesses. If for any reason this provision is not working, then the government wants to take your feedback and work on an action-plan to make it work. If this means that the banks, for some reason have displayed inhibition in co-operating with the businesses trying to avail of the government’s scheme, then we will take necessary action to rectify it.”

Subhash Goyal, Secretary General, FAITH, has revealed that the Association is in discussion with Ministry of Tourism to host a hybrid ITM by the end of this year. He said, “One interaction with the government has happened; and we are still in the progress of deciding how we are going to conduct it, whether it will be entirely virtual or hybrid. However, we will have ITM by the end of this year and we hope to announce the exact dates very soon.”

Global Panorama Showcase has tied up with Airlines Technology by TWAI, to offer NDC (New Distribution Capability) by IATA to agents in India at an affordable price. Harmandeep Singh Anand, MD, GPS, says, “NDC technology is the new solution and is the new normal, and it will be very useful to more than 4,000 IATA agents.” To this, Trideep Aggarwal, Co-Founder and Director, Airlines Technology by TWAI, adds, “Last couple of years, airlines have been pushing for NDC which allows them to distribute new things which they were not being able to do earlier. At the end of last year, we were in discussion with Varun Bansal, the CEO of Airlines Technology, as we were looking for enhancing our product offerings by having NDC on our platform. At the beginning of this year, we acquired Airlines Technology, and since then we have been merging everything with our platform. We are one of the largest NDC aggregators in the world. As of now, there are about 19 airlines on our platform, and we will have around 23 by the end of this year.”

Explaining the thought behind the recent acquisition of controlling interest in the Mumbai Airports, Gautam Adani, Chairman, Adani Group, says, “The Mumbai International Airport is absolutely world-class and I compliment the GVK Group for having built such an outstanding airport. The addition of the Mumbai International Airport and the Navi Mumbai International Airport to our existing portfolio of 6 airports provides us a transformational platform that will help shape and create strategic adjacencies for our other B2B businesses. This acquisition helps us redesign the way we will serve our customer base and bridge our B2C and B2B business models.”

In its recommendations on corporate loan restructuring submitted by the KV Kamath-led committee to Reserve Bank of India, tourism does not feature as a problem sector among the top five, which include aviation, real estate, automobiles, infrastructure and power. The committee has suggested solutions for 29 of the 307 sectors it assessed.

Terming non-refund of tickets booked during lockdown and the creation of an involuntary credit shell by airlines as violation of the civil aviation requirements and provisions of the Aircraft Rules of 1937, DGCA has informed the Supreme Court that tickets booked on both domestic and international carriers for air travel between March 25 to May 3 this year will be fully refunded.