The riverfront of Varanasi and the lanes leading to the ghats may undergo a facelift soon under the Clean India Campaign of the Ministry of Tourism (MoT), Government of India. A group of travel and tour operators, hoteliers, and NGOs, led by Parvez Dewan, Secretary Tourism, Government of India, and Usha Sharma, Additional Director General, MoT, Government of India, visited the city and inspected the ghats last week. After an inspection of the entire stretch of the riverfront through a boat ride, they also held a meeting on the banks of Ganga at Rajendra Prasad Ghat.
They were there to explore the avenues of development on a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model.
"Though further discussion and final decisions would be taken in Delhi, the main emphasis of this visit was to identify the ghats and lanes, and hold talks with interested private partners for the adoption of these culturally significant places," Avinash Mishra, Deputy Director, MoT, Government of Uttar Pradesh. Mishra was accompanying the visiting group. According to him, the development works would be funded by the Government of India while the private partners would look after the maintenance and proper cleaning of the facilities. All the modalities would be chalked out as per the prescribed norms of the campaign, according to a report by Binay Singh in The Times of India.