Hyderabad: Telangana, which rolled out its first-ever tourism policy for 2025-30, is eyeing inflows of over 10 crore domestic tourists and over 5 lakh international tourists by 2030. This is part of plans to catapult the state to India’s most preferred destination, according to tourism department sources.
The new policy, which was tabled before the Telangana assembly earlier this week, is expected to be approved by the state cabinet by the end of this month, sources added. The state drew over 5.86 crore tourists in 2023, including around 5.84 crore domestic and 1.6 lakh foreign tourists. In 2022, the state attracted a little over 6 crore tourists, including over 68,000 foreigners. The state’s share in domestic tourist arrivals dipped to 3.5% of the total national arrivals, putting it at the 9th spot.
To promote Telangana as an ideal tourism destination offering a mix of spiritual, heritage, MICE (meetings, incentives, conventions, and exhibitions), wildlife, adventure, and cinema tourism, among others, the Telangana tourism department also plans to kick off investment roadshows in India and abroad in the new year.
“From the first week of Jan, we plan to do investment roadshows in top cities of the country such as Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Delhi, as well as international destinations such as Singapore and Dubai,” Telangana Tourism Development Corporation Ltd Managing Director Nyalakonda Prakash Reddy told TOI.
He said they plan to engage with hospitality players to get them to invest in new hotel projects in the state, with the govt targeting an additional 15,000 hotel rooms of three-star category and above in the state, including 10,000 rooms in Hyderabad and the rest in other towns of the state, under the new policy. Currently, the state has an estimated 7,500 rooms of three-star and above, including 5,000 in Hyderabad alone.
Also on the cards is putting Hyderabad back on top in the MICE segment with plans to develop a 10,000-seat capacity convention centre at the proposed Future City, Reddy said, pointing out that HICC was the leading destination for conventions until it was edged out by Mumbai’s Jio World Convention Centre.
