ITDC eyes 10-15 pc growth in FY’23; asset monetization on track

a 10-15 per cent growth in FY2023, aided by a rise in domestic travel, a senior company official said. Speaking to UNI, India Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC) Director (Commercial and Marketing) Piyush Tiwari said the proposed asset monetization of eight of its properties is on track. ITDC, a PSU under the Tourism Ministry, runs hotels and restaurants at various places for tourists, besides operating duty-free shops at sea ports, providing transport facilities, engineering services and online ticketing. “India is in a better position from a domestic tourism perspective and it is growing. Therefore, we have to be focused on domestic tourism currently because international travel is going to take time to revive to pre-Covid levels,” Tiwari said. He noted that even though inflation might have an impact, it will be very minor. “When we speak from a domestic tourism stand point, people have been locked up in their homes and now want to venture out and travel…revenge tourism, as it is called. This will drive the growth of the hospitality and tourism industry, at least for the next one year,” Tiwari added. Stating that ITDC’s hospitality division is the largest contributor to its revenues, he said the growth was impacted in 2020-21 due to the pandemic. “However, our focus on growing other verticals has paid off well and we managed to sail through the tough times in the current fiscal. Now with the revival of the economy, we are hopeful of growing by 10-15 per cent in FY2023,” he added. Tiwari added that the event industry which had been badly impacted by the pandemic in the last two years, will see a comeback, though in a hybrid format. “The pandemic has given rise to hybrid events and people are preferring hybrid events. I feel the hybrid event concept is going to remain there even in the future. Domestic events are going to be on the rise because domestic tourism is reviving and so will the event industry. This will also give a boost to the hotel’s business,” Tiwari added. When asked about the asset monetization plan of the Ashok hotels as announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Tiwari said the plan is at discussion and finalization stage. The present network of ITDC consists of four Ashok Group of Hotels, four joint venture hotels, seven transport units’ part of the travel & tourism infrastructure, 14 duty free shops at seaports, one sound and light show and four catering outlets. The government has decided to lease out the Ashok 5-star hotel in Delhi and the adjacent Hotel Samrat, as well as six other ITDC properties, to private operators as part of its ambitious target of monetizing “under-utilized” public sector assets. “The report (on asset monetization) has been submitted by the consultant appointed by DIPAM and the process will start post the approval of competent authority. We feel Ashok is a kind of property that is very magnificent and will attract a lot of investors. It is one of its kind and there are very less properties of this stature as Ashok, in India,” he said adding the aim of the asset monetization is to maximize revenue from the available assets