Hyderabad, 27th September, 2015: In a glittering ceremony held at Taramati Baradari, Telangana Tourism Department gave away the Tourism awards on Sunday to coincide with the World Tourism Day. Pragati Resorts received ‘the Best Theme based Resort’ award for the year 2015 from K. Taraka Rama Rao, Minister for IT and Panchayat Raj. Addressing the august gathering KTR congratulated the award recipients and spoke about the wide potential of tourism to boost the economy of the state. KTR said that the economies of countries like Malaysia, Singapore and Srilanka are dependent on tourism sector to a large extent while the tremendous potential of tourism in India with its multi cultural and linguistic diversity remained untapped. A young state like Telangana promises boundless opportunities where imagination is the limit. Government can act only as a catalyst but with the active participation of various stake holders in the public private partnership mode.
Talking about the recent initiatives taken by the Telangana Government he said that the government has increased the tourism budget to INR 600 crore for 2015-16. In line with the state government’s focus on ecotourism and adventure tourism the central government is expected to grant 100 CR towards development of integrated eco-tourism circuit of Mahabubnagar.
Pragati Resorts sprawling over 85 acres of greenery, a nature’s paradise and a part of 2500 Pragati Biodiversity knowledge Park located in Poddutur and surrounding villages in Shankarpalli mandal of RR district in close proximity to the famous Chilkur Balaji Temple has secured this distinction for adopting the biodiversity theme. Pragati received the best biodiversity project award from Ministry of Urban Development, Govt. of India conferred by NAREDCO in 2014. Besides a series of tourism awards conferred by the State Government in the previous years Pragati has a real distinction for bagging the award for eco-friendly project for the years 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2012.
The award function was presided over by B. Venkatesham, Secretary – Tourism Department attended by K.V. Ramana Chary Advisor to Govt, P. Ramulu – Chairman, TS TDC, Christina, Managing Director TS TDC and other senior officials. On the occasion a Coffee table book on ‘Ancient temples of Telangana’ and another on ‘Protected monuments of Telangana’ was released. Also inaugurated a Mobile application on Tourism, Website of Department of Archaeology & Museum, Touch screen Kiosk, Short film on Archaeological and historical sites of Telangana.
Pragati Resorts and the knowledge park has been in the news in the recent past for having created a zero pollution environment free from mosquitoes, bad bacteria, viruses through the 780 varieties of sacred herbal heritage medicinal plantation that remove toxins and refresh an individual through aroma therapy. The contribution of Pragati for conservation of Biodiversity has been acknowledged by the UN Biodiversity convention in the presence of 600 city mayors of the world during the COP-11 event held in October, 2012. The 2.5 million plantation in the area with innovative techniques of gardening including Organic farming besides augmenting the water resources with water harvesting, drip irrigation, water sprinklers has reduced the temperature levels here by 6 – 7 degrees as compared to city levels. The Biodiversity inventory survey conducted in 2011 by WWF certified the existence of 181 species and 74 families in the area.
Chief Minister KCR has been referring to Pragati as a role model for creation of mosquito free zone in his recent public addresses and directing the concerned officials to visit Pragati along with the representatives of welfare associations and other local bodies to acquaint themselves with the healthy practices of plantation so that the technology could be replicated across the state. Pragati has also signed an MOU with Govt. of A.P. recently for setting up a world class biodiversity knowledge and theme park in Visakhapatnam.
The sacred heritage medicinal plants, our Aushadies, since time immemorial have helped to strive towards a disease free society. Pragati Resorts and the knowledge park have been developed on the theme of biodiversity by upholding the principles of Indian Vedic culture by giving utmost emphasis to the balanced development of flora and fauna.
