Mauritius Tourism Development Authority eyes 60,000 Indian tourists in 2014

Mauritius Tourism Development Authority (MTPA) today said it is eyeing 60,000 Indian tourists visiting the country in 2014, about 5 per cent higher than number of tourists visited in previous year.

"We are anticipating about 60,000 tourists from India to visit Mauritius in 2014 as against 58,000 tourists visited last year," MTPA, Deputy Director, Vijaye Haulder told reporters here today.

Out of total tourists' traffic from India, 40 per cent constitutes visitors from northern parts of India while rest of them is from Western and Southern parts, he said.

"India is a key market for tourism and we are confident of achieving our objective for current year," Haulder said.

With 90 per cent of Indian tourists being leisure tourists, MTPA Country Manager Vivek Anand said it is banking upon growing craze about destination weddings among Indian visitors in Mauritius.

"The demand for holding weddings by Indians in Mauritius is developing at fast pace over the past few years. We are witnessing big fat weddings happening at Mauritius," he said.

MTPA is conducting road shows at Chandigarh, Chennai, Hyderabad, and Kolkata starting today in order to promote Mauritius as best tourist destination.

"We are very positive to get response in all four cities at the road show as Mauritian stakeholders will showcase their products in this show to Indian traveller," he said.

Air Mauritius operates its flight from Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi, and Chennai.