Year: 2016

LEH: The Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council (LAHDC) has decided to design a software to charge Ladakh environment fees online for the convenience of tourists and to bring transparency to the system. LAHDC Leh Chief Executive Councillor (CEC) Dr. Sonam Dawa Lonpo convened a meeting to discuss about the utilization of environmental fees charged from tourists visiting Leh on Saturday. The meeting was attended by EC Works Dorjey Mutup, EC Agriculture Tsering Wangdus, EC Animal & Sheep Husbandry Mumtaz Hussain, all the councilors, nominated councilors, Administrator Municipal Committee, AD Tourism, Wildlife Warden, President All Ladakh Tour Operators Association (ALTOA), Hotel Association and Taxi Union. Addressing the meeting, CEC informed that at present under the account head of environment fees a total of Rs 3 crore has been collected which besides Ladakh environment fees includes rent of Ladakh House, Sindhu Sanskriti Kendra, Conference Hall, shooting charges and amount charged from non-residential students. He said that the objective of collecting Ladakh environment fees is to generate income resource for Council to make itself sustainable in some ways and to cut down the dependency on government funds which is meager to meet all the developmental needs and demands. “We cannot wait for government money to provide with facilities to promote tourism and it’s mandatory to take initiatives at our level to address the issues. It can only be achieved if we work in unity ensuring collective and coordinate efforts by all the stakeholders involved,” Dr Dawa said. During the meeting it was decided unanimously to make payment of environment fees online for domestic tourists also to ensure transparency in the system. It was also decided to enhance the environmental fee for both foreign and domestic tourists from next year onwards and CEC urged the concern stakeholders to come up with a fee structure