Advisor to Governor Khurshid Ahmad Ganai on Sunday urged the national and international golf players to act as the ambassadors of Kashmir back home to promote it as a peaceful and an incredible destination to visit.
Ganai was speaking during award distribution ceremony to the winners of 7th J&K Golf Association Tournament at Royal Springs Golf Course.
While congratulating the winners, Ganai said J&K is producing some of the best golf players in the country and the tradition of golf has been kept alive by the golfers who play in various courses of the state and organize tournaments on regular basis. He stressed on the national and international golfers to help in removing various stereotypes and promote JK as a peaceful tourist destination. He said that organizing such events will help to send a loud and clear message that Kashmir is still an incredible destination to visit and people must come and enjoy themselves as tourists and golfers. He hoped that such tournaments will help in focusing the attention of prospective tourists on Kashmir in the ongoing autumn season.
Expressing concern over the decline in footfall of tourists in past few months, Ganai said that extra efforts need to be taken to remove the negativity among the people about this place. He held that golfers can act as ambassadors to help in projecting the real picture of Kashmir before the people so that they are attracted towards the natural beauty of Kashmir besides other attractions including the golf and other winter sports. Ganai said that the JK Tourism Department is soon organizing a Fame Carnival at SKICC where guests from outside the state will be taken to different places with an aim to present a real picture of Kashmir that it is peaceful and waiting for the tourist to come. The advisor congratulated and thanked golfers for choosing Kashmir as their favorite destination especially Shiv Kapoor, who has played golf around 80 countries and has twenty amateur and 11 professional titles to his name.
“The players like Shiv Kapoor have international fame and their presence in our courses will definitely promote J&K as golfing destination. We are expecting good number of golfers to visit J&K for more such tournaments in the future,” he said.