After having lived in Hyderabad's shadow for long, the coastal city of Visakhapatnam is all set to make waves on the global map as a tourism hotspot, if the AP government has its way.
The AP tourism department has, along with infrastructure giant IL&FS, drawn up a Rs 500-crore Vizag tourism development plan to develop the city as a world class leisure and business tourism destination with a mix of public and private funding.
As part of this, a 30-km stretch of Vizag's beachfront starting from RK Beach to Bheemili will get a major infrastructure facelift, with a host of tourist attractions dotting the city's beaches, said AP tourism secretary Jayesh Ranjan.
On the itinerary are blockbuster tourist attractions like an underwater world project, to be developed by Haw Par Corporation, the architect of the Singapore project. Also on the cards are development of Rushikonda beach as an adventure tourism hub, cruises from Vizag to destinations like Andaman and Nicobar Islands, upgradation of the narrow gauge train from Vizag to Araku Valley into a tourist train on the lines of trains plying in Darjeeling and Ooty, sea plane facilities, among other things.
To ensure that tourists spend more time in Vizag, plans are also afoot to develop the entire Vizag region, including nearby tourist attractions like Aaraku valley, backwater cruises at Rajahmundry and the Simhachalam temple.
"Vizag's uniqueness is that it is one of the few cities in the world where the sea and the hills are in such close proximity. Internationally a few cities in the world can boast of this," said Ranjan pointing out that the Union tourism ministry had already approved Vizag as a pilot for the ministry's omnibus scheme for regional tourism circuit development.
The peaceful shores of Vizag are already emerging as a popular business destination, thanks to the upcoming PCPIR, pharma and IT SEZs, and the T-trouble that has plagued Hyderabad for the better part of the past two years.
Tourism industry sources feel that with the influx of capital, the rising business tourist traffic is already making the city an attractive MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions) destination and hospitality giants are already scrambling to cash in on this potential.
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