About India Outbound Magazine

India Outbound is India’s only B2B travel media platform, that encompasses a print magazine, a website, an online TV channel and dynamic social media platforms, entirely dedicated to the promotion of foreign destinations and products in India. India Outbound is a niche platform not just for tourism destinations and products to promote themselves to the Indian travel industry, but also for decision makers to build/change their strategy in a context where the Indian outbound market is not only growing but changing with new dynamics. These trends, India Outbound analyse and predict them.

Emirates grounds all flights

After days of deliberations, Emirates Airlines, which operates the world's largest network of a single carrier, has decided to ground all planes in view of the Covid-19 pandemic. The carrier enjoys a lion's share of the Indian outbound market with over 170 flights a week. EK 005 to London Heathrow, which departed at 1605hrs on March 24, was the last flight to take off from Dubai. EK 262 from Sao Paulo, which landed at 2235hrs (local time) was the last flight to arrive on March 25, into Dubai.

Over the next weeks, Emirates’ operational teams will focus on preparing for service resumption. The airline says that it will resume passenger services as soon as it is possible to do so. In the meantime, Emirates is still busy deploying its fleet of Boeing 777 freighters, bolstering international air cargo links for the transport of vital goods, including medical supplies and food, around the world.

Government defers new travel tax to October, tourism industry expects package

The Indian Parliament passed the Finance Bill, 2020 to levy tax collected at source (TCS) on sale of goods which is going to directly affect the travel industry, especially the outbound tour package sellers. The effective date, however, is deferred to October 1, 2020.

Finance & Corporate Affairs minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced on March 24 a few important relief measures taken by the Indian government in view of COVID-19 outbreak, especially on statutory and regulatory compliance matters related to income tax, GST, customs & central excise, corporate affairs, insolvency & bankruptcy code (IBC), fisheries, banking sector and commerce.

The Outbound Tour Operators Association of India (OTOAI) and other tourism bodies through its office bearers met the ministry of tourism and ministry of finance officials and made representations for rollback of TCS given the challenging scenario and the burden it will put on the outbound tour operators in the wake of COVID19 outbreak. The ministry had heard the representations and had assured for a favourable solution including deferment.

So far, the finance ministry has only deferred the provisions in the newly amended section 206C regarding TCS to be applicable from October 01, 2020 instead of April 01, 2020 as originally proposed. The stakeholders and leaders in the private sector are continuing their plea to the government for a bailout package to save the Indian tourism industry which heavily depends on outbound, inbound as well as domestic travel.

Turismo de Portugal transforms communication to #CantSkipHope

The Portuguese Tourism Board has transformed the communication of the destination from #CantSkipPortugal into #CantSkipHope, in the wake of ongoing corona pandemic. The tourism board has released a video focusing on the necessity to pause, refocus and join efforts so that the entire world can move forward.

“Above all, we would like for this film to serve as an inspiration for a broader reflection and that it would also be an example of a country’s effort to raise awareness and unite everyone to overcome this difficult moment in human history,” says Luís Araújo, president of the Portuguese Tourism Board.

Following the WHO guidelines, the video has been prepared with the entire team working from home, making good use of recent archive footage from the Portuguese Tourism Board and voiceover using a smart phone.

India Outbound is a publication of Media India Group