Jammu, June 22 (UNI) Terming tourism as backbone of economy, Jammu and Kashmir Deputy Chief Minister Surinder Choudhary has said that the government is focusing on better road connectivity to flourish tourism across Jammu and Kashmir.

“Tourism sector is the backbone for our economy and to augment this sector, our government is paying special focus on enhanced road connectivity,” Choudhary told UNI.

He said, “Jammu and Kashmir is blessed with types of tourism like leisure, border, pilgrimage, health and wellness and much more.”

And, to smoothly facilitate tourists to several such destinations, better road connectivity is the top priority for the government, said the Deputy Chief Minister.

Chief Minister Omar Abdullah himself is keen to develop and promote the tourist destinations across Jammu and Kashmir particularly those virgin and unexplored.

“His focus is also on Jammu region especially after the start of Katra-Srinagar train,” he said adding, “the tourist spots across Jammu region are being given major attention to woo large numbers of tourists to boost our economy.”

“We are working to further augment the road connectivity,” he said and appealed to the general public to play their role by sharing the condition of roads in their respective areas on social media platforms so that prompt action can be initiated and the grievances can be addressed.

On payment to contractors engaged for blacktopping, the Deputy Chief Minister said, “the monsoon season will be a litmus test for the contractors and payments will be cleared without any delay after testing the macadamization work.”

The Deputy Chief Minister however, also stressed on coordination between executing agencies so that frequent digging of roads can be prevented.



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