Member of House of Representatives<\/strong><\/p>\n Tourism Bill does not address the demands of the private sector, there is no point in passing it as it is: MP Regmi <\/strong><\/p>\n ‘Fifty years later’ The law related to tourism should solve all the problems’<\/strong><\/p>\n Kathmandu. Member of the International Relations and Tourism Committee of the Federal Parliament and Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) lawmaker Dr Dhananjaya Regmi said that the proposed tourism bill has failed to address the demands of the private sector since many years. <\/p>\n In an interview with Nepal News Bank, Regmi said that he has been involved in the drafting process of the tourism bill since 2019 and claimed that although the initial objective was to make business-friendly laws, the bill that reached the parliament in the end was the opposite. According to him, the preliminary draft prepared during the tenure of the then Tourism Minister Yogesh Bhattarai was aimed at creating an environment conducive for the private sector to operate in a smooth manner, removing excessive fine-based regulation and encouraging the tourism industry. <\/p>\n “Looking at the bill that has come from the National Assembly to the House of Representatives, most of the issues demanded by the private sector have disappeared. Instead, it seems that it has become more control-oriented than the old law,” he said. <\/p>\n Regmi alleged that even after reaching the parliamentary committee, the writing of the bill was ultimately under the influence of the ministry staff. “The people’s representatives are not all experts in tourism. At the end of the day, the draft is prepared by the staff of the secretariat and they make arrangements to protect their own regulatory powers,” he said. He said that the role of the government should not be to run the business but to make standards and facilitate the private sector. <\/p>\n “If the government wants to run the hotel on its own, it should open government hotels in Api, Rara and Shey-Phoksundo. But if the private sector is to promote hotels, trekking and tourism, then their real problems should be solved,” he said. <\/p>\n According to Regmi, the hoteliers have been demanding for a long time to provide electricity tariffs, tax exemptions and other concessions to the hotel industry on par with industries. But he alleged that no government has addressed these demands. <\/p>\n He said that the tourism bill should include separate problems related to hotel, trekking, travel, mountaineering, homestay and tourism transport sector.<\/p>\n “Fifty years later, the law should address all these problems at this juncture,” he said. <\/p>\n ‘The style of making after the regulations is wrong’ <\/p>\n Regmi also objected to the fact that many provisions in the bill were left saying that ‘they will be according to the rules’. According to him, if there is no clear draft of the regulations along with the Act, then the situation will arise in the parliament to pass incomplete laws. <\/p>\n “If the Act says that everything will be in the regulations, then the question arises as to what the parliament is passing,” he said. He also stressed the need of using modern technology to address the problems related to fake rescue, trekking monitoring and insurance seen in the mountaineering sector. <\/p>\n He said that satellite tracking equipment should be made mandatory for trekkers, priority should be given to Nepali insurance companies and strict action should be taken against foreign insurance companies and foreign trekking operators operating illegally in Nepal. “Let us first make the rules clear and then take strict action against those who violate it,” he said. <\/p>\n Regmi said that foreign universities and scientists who come to Nepal for research and filming have to face a lot of administrative hassles.<\/p>\n According to him, the research should be eased by removing the provision of taking permission from many bodies from taking samples of stones abroad to flying drones. <\/p>\n “The process should be simplified by making it mandatory to share the research reports of foreign universities with the Government of Nepal,” he suggested. Considering the Nepal Tourism Board as a necessary institution, he said that the effectiveness of the board has weakened in recent years due to political appointments. “90 percent of the employees are good. But the foreign travel-oriented mentality of some employees and the political appointees of the board members have weakened the organization,” he said.<\/p>\n He also proposed to partner with big international tour operators and media houses rather than opening government offices abroad for tourism promotion. <\/p>\n According to him, the number of tourists can be increased significantly by collaborating directly with Kesari Travels of India, Make My Trip, major tour operators of Japan and trekking companies of Europe and America. He gave the example of a rafting entrepreneur from Karnali participating in the international tourism fair for the first time and said that new entrepreneurs should be given opportunities in the international market. Regmi said that although there is a high possibility of investment in the hotel sector in Nepal, the expansion of tourism has been hindered due to weak air connectivity.<\/p>\n He suggested that the Nepal Airlines should operate aircraft on government-government model instead of getting entangled in dispute over purchasing the aircraft. <\/p>\n “We should not seek profit only from tickets. We need to think that the country will earn money from the money, employment and taxes that tourists spend when they come to Nepal,” he said. Regmi said that the long-term improvement of the tourism sector would be possible only if the bill moves forward at the current pace, adding that the suggestions of the private sector are actually incorporated. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n Dr. Dhananjay Regmi Member of House of Representatives Tourism Bill does not address the demands of the private sector, there is no point in passing it as it is: MP Regmi ‘Fifty years later’ The law related to tourism should solve all the problems’ Kathmandu. Member of the International Relations and Tourism Committee of theContinue reading “Tourism bill won’t address private sector’s demands: Lawmaker Regmi”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":98802,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[147],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-98819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-samachar-en"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/web-post_786b0f3a.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98819"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98819\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98820,"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98819\/revisions\/98820"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/media\/98802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arthakhabar.com\/ak_api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} <\/p>\n
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