SWADESH DARSHAN SCHEME
SWADESH DARSHAN SCHEME
IN NEWS – The recent developments taking place under the Swadesh Darshan Scheme have widely been in news.
ABOUT
- Swadesh Darshan Scheme provides financial assistance to the state governments/ UT administration/central agencies to develop tourism infrastructure in the country.
- It was launched in 2014-15 for integrated development of theme-based tourist circuits — Buddhist Circuit, Coastal Circuit, Desert Circuit, Eco Circuit, Heritage Circuit, Northeast Circuit, Himalayan Circuit, Sufi Circuit, Krishna Circuit, Ramayana Circuit, Rural Circuit, Spiritual Circuit, Tirthankar Circuit, Wildlife Circuit and Tribal Circuit.
- Objective: To position tourism as a significant engine of economic growth and job creation following community based development and a pro-poor tourism approach.
- It is 100% centrally funded and efforts are made to achieve convergence with other schemes of Central and State Governments and also to leverage the voluntary funding available for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives of Central Public Sector Undertakings and Corporate Sector.
- Status: 76 Projects have been sanctioned across 31 States/Union territories with a total capital outlay of ₹ 5294.1 Crore.
- Swadesh Darshan 2.0: The Swadesh Darshan scheme was revamped to create a robust framework for integrated development of tourism destinations in partnership with the States/ UTs and local governments.
- Aim: Promoting sustainable and responsible tourism.
- Status: The Ministry has notified 57 destinations from 32 States and Union Territories. It has sanctioned 29 tourist experiences in 17 States/UTs amounting to ₹ 644.44 Crore to date.
SWADESH DARSHAN SCHEME 2.0
- With the mantra of ‘vocal for local’, the revamped scheme namely Swadesh Darshan 2.0 seeks to attain “Aatmanirbhar Bharat” by realizing India’s full potential as a tourism destination.
- Swadesh Darshan 2.0 is not an incremental change but a generational shift to evolve the Swadesh Darshan Scheme as a holistic mission to develop sustainable and responsible tourism destinations.
- It will help develop sustainable and responsible destinations with a tourist and destination centric approach.
- It will encourage the development of benchmarks and standards for generic and theme-specific development of tourism destinations and the States will follow the benchmarks and standards while planning and developing the projects.
- The following major themes have been identified for tourism under the Scheme:
- Culture and Heritage
- Adventure Tourism
- Eco-Tourism
- Wellness Tourism
- MICE Tourism
- Rural Tourism
- Beach Tourism
- Cruises – Ocean & Inland