The Nepal Tourism Board has mega plans to double the number of tourists from India visiting the country in the ensuing year.

With the theme – Visit Nepal 2020 – the Tourism Board has conducted road shows in Kochi and Coimbatore and showcased a number of attractive tourist spots and must-see locations including trekking to Kailash.

“From the present two lakh tourists, who have visited Nepal by air from India every year, we plan to take the number to four lakh this year”, said Laxman Gautam expert-adviser, Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation, Government of Nepal, here on Friday.

He said that people from heritage city like Madurai were religious and intend to visit Nepal. Thus, the Nepal Tourism Board had taken the initiative to reach out here and disseminate through the stakeholders features about the neighbouring country. “For a visitor, the monuments, inscriptions and carvings and related stories are not only interesting but also throw light on the spiritual values,” he noted.

The organisers had arranged for an interaction with travel agents to share about the tour packages and the places to visit in Nepal at the Poppys Hotel. There was good air connectivity from New Delhi, they added.

A travel agent said that if the Indian government introduced direct air connectivity from Madurai to Kathmandu, it would be a boon to the tourism sector.