Amaravati: Hotel industry set for a boom

Vijayawada: Around 30 giants in the hospitality sector of national and international repute have evinced keen interest in setting up hotels and convention centres in Amaravati and agreed to participate in the EoI (Expression of Interest) stage that will take place in 15 days. A roundtable conference was conducted here on Tuesday to generate interest on Amaravati among hoteliers and their developers.

The roundtable was chaired by principal secretary (CRDA) - Ajay Jain and CRDA commissioner Ch. Sreedhar. Mr Jain highlighted the potential in the sector to the delegates, saying that the CRDA was adopting single window system for approvals and clearances. Mr Sreedhar said that there was no doubt that Amaravati will be the most modern capital city with updated planning model, with a population of over four lakh within three years. He also gave an idea of the land extent being discussed for each category of hotels.

N. Srikant, A tourism secretary, and APTDC MD Girija Shankar also participated. The Subhaash Gulaati Group, which owns two hotels, including the Ramada Hotel in Birmingham in United Kingdom, expressed the desire to set up an integrated property with a shopping mall, office space and a 5-star hotel in Amaravati. Malaxmi Property Ventures proposed a 200-room hotel on 10 acres.

ITC Hotels expressed interest in a 4-star hotels in the initial phase. ITC also shared the preferred land extents of three acre, four acre and 4.5-5.5 acre for 3-star, 4-star and 5-star hotels respectively and was in agreement with both land sale and long term lease model, according to A. Chandrasekhar Reddy, media advisor-CRDA.

Fortune Murali Park, which is looking to set up a 200-room hotel in the capital city, said that a freehold land model would be best preferred. Novotel expressed the desire to set up a budget 100-room hotel in Phase 1 before moving to mid-scale and luxury segments. After detailed discussions, Ajay Jain proposed to release an EOI (Expression of Interest) incorporating the suggestions from conference within two weeks and assured all support from the government to ensure that allotment of required land and approvals is finalised at the earliest.