BY AJAY RAMOLA
MUSSOORIE, 2 Aug: “An aquarium in a hill station town is a marvel.”This was said by Finance Minister of Kerala, Dr P Thomas Isaac, on his visit to Jawahar Aquarium, here, today. He is in Uttarakhand to learn from the efforts made by Uttarakhand in Temple Tourism and how Kerala, too, could develop similar circuits.
Along with his family, he enjoyed the variety of fish in the aquarium. The managers of the aquarium, the Sharma brothers, provided a guided tour and described the fish in detail. Issac commended the effort of the Palika and Jawahar Aquarium in maintaining such a property in the mountains. He also suggested that an online touch screen information centre could be developed along with the brochures and catalogue of the fish in the aquarium, which would make it quite innovative.
Later, speaking to Garhwal Post, Dr P Thomas Isaac stated that this was his first visit to Uttarakhand and he was looking forward to visiting Rishikesh, Haridwar, Valley of Flowers and Badrinath, and felt that this had been an extremely rewarding trip for him, so far.
Speaking about tourism promotion done by Kerala, the Finance Minister stated that “the challenge is to make tourism a product out of your resources and market it to a targeted clientele”. Kerala had backwater lagoons and lake water tourism had become an important product, along with the traditional Ayurvedic treatment, which was also being marketed in a big way. He further said that the Monsoon was off season in Kerala and Government was trying to market that season by introducing various activities like Ayurvedic Massage and a Rain Dance festival to bring tourists in during the lean period as Monsoon Tourism. He also opined that Uttarakhand had a lot of tradition and history, which had a market in itself, and Kerala could learn a lot from Uttarakhand, especially in Temple tourism. Kerala was developing a heritage project, since it had an unbroken history since 100 BC. He further said that there were a large number of settlers since the beginning of the Roman Empire, which had been proved through carbon dating method by Georgia University recently.
The Finance Minister was also presented a memento as a token of affection from the Nagar Palika and Jawahar Aquarium, on the occasion. The managers of the Jawahar Aquarium, Bimal and Harish Sharma, were delighted at the suggestions provided by the minister and said they would try to implement them as soon as possible.
Speaking on the political situation in Kerala, Issac said that the recent Lok Sabha elections were not in favour of the left. It had been a trend in Kerala that the Left and Congress alternatively come to power, so it was not a big issue. Factionalism in the party was a larger issue, which had been resolved amicably and all the problems had been sorted out.
ACl Commercial Tax RL Verma, Arjun Singh, CTO, and others were also present on the occasion.

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