The Government has opened 137 mountain peaks for foreigners desirous of obtaining Mountaineering Visa (MX) for mountaineering and trekking. These peaks are located in the states of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Sikkim. While the highest numbers of 51 peaks have been opened to foreigners in Uttarakhand, 15 peaks of Jammu and Kashmir have also been included in the list.
Prahlad Singh Patel, Minister of State for Culture and Tourism (IC) has expressed his gratitude to the Ministry of Home Affairs for acceding to the request of Tourism Ministry to open up more peaks to foreigners. It is an historic step towards promoting adventure tourism in the country, Patel said.
Earlier, while addressing the Tourism Ministers from States/UTs at the National Tourism Conference in New Delhi recently, Patel emphasized on the need for ensuring safety of those travellers going for adventure tourism. He urged the states to exercise utmost caution while registering adventure tourism operators and also to ensure that the adventure tourism guidelines are followed by the states.