Kerala Tourist Season Gearing Up

Down south in Kerala we are gearing up for the start of the high tourist season. Hotel fronts are sneakily painted in between cloudbursts that don't want to leave us, staff are sharpening up after the soporific atmosphere of monsoon and the politicians promise us that the road potholes will soon be filled. But will the tourists come this year and if so, why?

The answer is evident. Kerala has outclassed most other states with the sheer ingenuity of its tourism products. If you want to live with the drumbeat of nature, come to Vythiri and have yourself pulleyed up in a rope basket to your treehouse. You want to spend time on the water in the most serene surroundings of palm-fringed paddy fields, then come to Alleppey and spoil yourself with a houseboat cruise. For a glimpse at the past with top-notch modern comforts, stay in a heritage hotel. Fancy sea and sand? There's Kovalam and Varkala. Get to know a Malayalee family? Why not? They will invite you to their homestay. And we haven't even touched on north Kerala yet.

But for all the luscious green landscape, the sandy beaches and indeed the sharp marketing that wins several tourism awards both nationally and internationally, for me as a westerner, Kerala's crowning glory is something so 'normal' that locals pay no heed to it. In fact they have little awareness of it. Because it is themselves. The Malayalees. There is a sensitive gentleness, a willingness to help, unrivalled smiles and most significantly, little of the aggressive selling by unmonitored touts and taxi men that has invaded the magnificent tourism shrines of the north. Ok, so there's a whiff of it in Fort Cochin at times - I'm not wearing my rosy-tinted specs today - but let's keep it at whiff-level. No tourist minds a whiff of anything.

IT, ITES majors invited to invest in Kerala

Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achutanandan on Sunday invited information technology (IT) and IT-enabled services majors to invest in his State, which had created a world-class infrastructure, an industry-friendly climate and free from labour unrest.

Addressing presspersons before launching the first-ever road show here and meeting with the representatives of the IT majors, Mr. Achutanandan said that the IT captains such as Infosys Chief Mentor N.R. Narayana Murthy, who had visited the Technopark and Infopark in his State, were impressed by the infrastructure and clean-green atmosphere there.

Mr. Achutanandan, who visited the Infosys Technologies campus at Electronics City, said that the corporate houses were happy with the progressive policies and low operational costs and were eager to shift their expansion programmes to Kerala.

He said that investments to the tune of about Rs. 6,000 crore had been made in these two parks and another Rs. 6,000 crore in Technocity and other areas was in the offing. An apex company had been created and project-specific special purpose vehicles would handle the new IT projects. There will be a uniform spread of IT development in all the districts, he said.

A 507-acre IT township — Technocity — would come up in Thiruvananthapuram and work on the smart city project at Kochi would commence by the end of October. Apart from this, IT parks were coming up in all the districts. He said that the State had the best IT/ITES trained manpower, 75 per cent savings on start-up and operational costs and a strong data backbone.

Kerala IT Secretary K.R. Jyothilal said his State had learnt lessons from Karnataka’s problems in handling the IT industry and that the IT majors would not find any problems in investing there. He said that the State had entered into collaboration with Infosys for starting Finishing Schools for the weaker sections. Shashi Tharoor, former Under Secretary of the United Nations, was also helping the state in establishing more finishing schools, he said.

Mr. Jyothilal said that it was the policy of the Government to introduce computer training and 38,000 students in 2,800 high schools had been getting training. Next year, the number would rise to two lakh.

LDF panel sets deadline for Kerala Congress(J)

The State committee of the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) has set October 12 as the deadline for the Kerala Congress (J) to come up with its Minister nominee.

The LDF leadership, which discussed the issue here on Monday, told the KC(J) leaders present at the meeting, including party chairman P.J. Joseph, that it could not allow the position allotted to the KC(J) in the Cabinet to remain vacant beyond October 12 as that would cause much embarrassment to the LDF and the government. The position has been remaining vacant for the last one month following the resignation of T.U. Kuruvilla as Public Works Minister. Mr. Kuruvilla himself had become Minister over a year ago when Mr. Joseph stepped down following allegations that he had misbehaved with a woman co-passenger while on a flight from Chennai to Kochi.

NRIs form group to make Kerala an IT hub

The Kerala Information Technology Alliance (KITA) has been launched here to make Kerala a premier global technology hub.

Ommen Chandy, a former chief minister of Kerala, inaugurated KITA at the Kerala Centre in the presence of over 150 IT professionals and community leaders.

Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan said in a message: "I hope KITA will provide a platform for IT professionals of Kerala origin to share best practices, ideas and thereby influence and accelerate the growth of Kerala in key industries."

A voluntary body, KITA hopes to provide the network and connections for Malayalees and IT professionals worldwide to tap their collective intelligence and to innovate.

Kerala HC stays eviction notice

The Kerala High Court today stayed the eviction notice issued against the occupants of Merchiston estate including Indian Institute of Space Science Technology.

Admitting a writ petition filed by the estate owner Xavie Mano Mathew and Indian Institute of Space Sciences Technology, challenging the notice, the division Bench, comprising Chief Justice H L Dattu and Justice K T Sankaran stayed eviction proceedings for a period of three weeks.

The Thiruvananthapuram District Forest Officer and Custodian of Ecologically Fragile Land had issued eviction notice to the petitioners.

Additional advocate general, appearing for the state said, eviction proceedings would not be carried out.

Recording this assurance, the bench stayed the eviction proceedings.

Meanwhile, two PILs seeking CBI investigation into the Merchiston estate land deal at Ponmudi near Thiruvanathapuram. was also admitted by the court.

ISRO had entered into the land deal with the estate owner for setting up its Space Institute. The court also directed the government to file counter-affidavit

Govt docs stage indefinite strike in Kerala

Government doctors across Kerala launched an indefinite ‘non-cooperation’ strike yesterday in protest against the state government’s failure to keep the promises made to them regarding their salary and other service conditions a year ago.

They boycotted all special tasks like immunisation programmes, pay ward functions, VIP duties, medical camps and works under the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) as part of the strike launched under the aegis of Kerala Government Medical Officer Association (KGMOA).

KGMOA leaders said the promises given by Health Minister P.K. Sreemathy following a 150-day agitation last year were to be fulfilled by April 2007. They said that the doctors had given enough time before beginning the strike to consider the demands, which included an upward revision in the salary and filling of nearly 600 vacancies in hospitals.

The Indian Medical Association and Kerala Government Medical College Teachers’ Association have backed the strike.xMallu