Budget 2019: Tourism firms demand corporate tax reduction across board, better infrastructure

On account of fluctuating corporate tax slabs decelerated the pace and scale of benefits of the tourism companies operating in India, the Indian tourism companies have demanded from the Prime Minister Narendra Modi to reduce corporate tax at 25 per cent across board. They said the move would help the industry to grow faster creating more job opportunities in coming year.

Speaking on the demand Mahesh Iyer, ED and CEO, Thomas Cook India Limited told Zee Business online, "While the Union Budget 2015-16 proposed a reduction in the Corporate Tax from 30 per cent to 25 per cent, the fluctuating slabs decelerated the pace and scale of benefits. Hence, for the FY 2019-20, we look forward to a reduced corporate tax structure of 25 per cent across the board.” He said the travel & tourism sector is one of the key contributors to the Country’s GDP, and a vibrant tourism industry not only catalyses growth in allied sectors like hospitality and aviation, but also plays a vital role in direct and indirect employment generation. 

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Sunil Gupta, MD and CEO, Avis India, told Zee Business Online that the government needs to spend more on infrastructure this year. 

"India is rapidly growing to be a large market for travel and tourism industry and is expecting international tourist arrivals to reach 30.5 million by 2028, therefore the government should focus more on improving the infrastructure of the country in terms of developing more roads and maintenance of tourist places for increasing the economy from tourism. The government needs to allocate much more towards infrastructure this year as last year government increased infra spend towards roads, air, rail and inland waterways by almost 22 per cent to 5.97 lac crores, wherein we are expecting it to get an increase to 30 per cent this year," he said.