Nepal Tourist Board eager to work out Goa-Nepal casino circuit

The Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) plans to tie up with Goa’s tourism players to swap foreign tourist arrivals at both locations, senior officials said. The Nepal Association of Tour and Travel Agents (NATTA) and NTB officials are currently in Goa for a business-to-business (B2B) conference with Goa tourism players to push the idea of promoting each other’s destination among foreign tourists. Nepal’s tourism industry is looking to attract foreign tourists who throng Goa’s beaches to destinations like Pokhara which is home to three among the ten highest mountains in the world. NTB Managing Director Basu Tripathi told reporters in Goa today that foreign tourists who visit the coastal Indian state could also visit Pokhara for a different experience. He said Goa could also benefit from foreign tourist footfalls attracted by Pokhara and other tourist destinations in the Himalayan country. NBT Senior Assistant Manager Udaya Bhattarai said Nepal and Goa, which have casinos in common, could think of having a tourism circuit, but it would be for private players to decide, since the casino business is not government-owned. “The casino business in Nepal is privately owned. So the possibility of having a casino circuit with Goa could be worked out by them,” he said, responding to a question. Bhattarai said the majority of people visiting casinos are Indians and high profile tourists. source: The Economic Times