Namaste Friends, Indian Tourism has continued its winning streak at the PATA Awards, winning the 2005 PATA Grand Award in the Heritage (HE) category, for its ‘Ajanta Ellora Conservation & Tourism Development Project" and the PATA Gold Award in the Print Media (AD-P) category for its "Incredible-Taj" ads.             Indian Tourism has had a lot to celebrate over the past year.     Foreign tourist arrivals in India during 2004 went up by an average of 25.9% over corresponding figures of 2003 and foreign exchange earnings were up by nearly 40%   India is poised to emerge as the 2nd fastest growing (8.8%) tourism economy in the world over 2005-14 according to the World Travel & Tourism Council   India made it to No.5 on the top 10 destination list for 2004 by Chicago based iExplore.com, a dramatic vault from the 36th slot it occupied in 2003   The Lonely Planet Pulse Survey conducted among 20,000 respondents across 167 countries, ranked India among the top five most desired tourist destinations                   These awards and accolades reiterate what the cognoscenti have long known … that India is a truly incredible destination, unlike any other.           For help planning your India holiday, please visit           Regards, Amitabh Kant Joint Secretary Ministry of Tourism http://www.incredibleindia.org           To unsubscribe to this newsletter, click here. You can log on to www.incredibleindia.org to subscribe again.