A team led by Pokhara Tourism Council chairperson, Gopi Bhattarai appealed the Finance Minister Ramji Baral of Gandaki Province, yesterday demanding immediate provision of COVID-19 vaccines for tourism workers and entrepreneurs based in this industry.

Pokhara. 

The delegates constituting of entrepreneurs Agni Kandel, Basu Tripathi, Tikaram Sapkota and Gopi Bhattarai presented their pleas to the Finance Minister citing the need of 5,000 doses of vaccines for the workers and businesspeople associated in this sector during this initial stage to ensure the smooth run of the tourism businesses which have been severely hit by the pandemic and were also expecting that in the monetary policy of the fiscal year 2021-22, the provincial government would lay emphasis on tourism industry. Besides that, their other demand included- the banking institutions should adjust the repayment tenure i.e. extending time to loan repayment wherin it was impossible for them to repay bank's installment nor the interest of loan within two years and instead have asked the financial institutions to make a flow of at least five percent of its loan portfolio to this sector in a subsidized interest rate.'We have been settling onto this margin of vaccination albeit a requirement of about 20,000 doses needed for the entire tourism entrepreneurs based in Pokhara', said Bhattarai.On the other hand, Minister Baral assured that the state government has approached the federal government to procure the vaccines. He even asserted to revive this covid-affected industry with various effective plans and revitalising programmes. 

Note : This article is paraphrased from the main news source of RSS.