Raja Rani Travels On An Expansion Spree

Charmaine Fernz - Mumbai

The Indian domestic tourist market though full of potential still remains a golden goose waiting to be explored. It is only in the past few years that travel agents and tour operators are looking out of the box and beyond regulars like Rajasthan, Goa and Kerala to more unexplored terrain like Uttaranchal, Himachal, J&K etc and one of them is Raja Rani Travels. Though a 46-year old company, it prides itself in catering to community-based tourism proactively promoting the J&K region, within the Maharashtrain community.

Explains Abhijeet Raja Patil, CEO, Raja Rani Travels P Ltd, "We definitely have a strong foothold on the J&K market and could even say that we have been in certain ways responsible for the opening up of Kashmir as a tourist destination. All of these initiatives can only be attributed to my late father, who has been instrumental in paving the way. Also to build J&K as a tourist destination, an economic handshake is very vital. In the last three years, we have taken about 10,000 tourists to the destination and are looking at increasing this numbers."

Elucidating on the company's future plans, Patil said, "We are in the process of rebuilding our office, which is an ISO 9001-2000 certified company. In J&K, there are very few quality hotels, so we do look into the upgradation of certain hotel properties in Sri Nagar and Pahalgam and are also looking at properties in other areas such as Gulmarg and Jamam. We pride ourselves in specifically catering to the domestic and J&K market, as we provide our passengers an experience like never before. To substantiate facts, we have tripled our inventory in Kashmir after last year, are launching two exclusive packages for Gujarat and also the LoC package for Kashmir, which is an experience to remember. Our success could be attributed not just to our initiatives but also huge support that we receive from the J&K people. Subsequently, apart from just focusing on the J&K market after a gap of 12 years, we are reviving our outbound division catering to markets such as Europe, Middle-East and South East Asia. We are looking at niche tours as it sets one apart as well as increasing our tourist numbers.

"We have also been nominated the GSA (General Sales Agent) for the Sheri Convention Centre that is adjacent to the Centaur Hotel in J&K and would be looking at becoming members of various associations such as TAAI, TAFI, PATA etc. And finally, we are in the process of formulating a package wherein people from J&K can tour Maharshtra."