IRCTC is today one of the leading travel and tourism companies in the country with its presence in almost all forms of tourism. The company which had initially pitched itself as a mass tourism player promoting rail-bound tourism has over the time transformed itself in to a multi-model travel and tourism organisation offering a wide gamut of tourism products to the market according to their choices and demands. Today, IRCTC offers tour packages to the customers with various means of transport such as air and road in addition to rail.
In order to further penetrate the tourist market and promote in-land waterways as an attractive mode of tourism to the domestic and inbound tourist market, IRCTC has recently unleashed its latest offering of marketing of river cruise tour packages in association with major river cruise operating companies.
In a latest, IRCTC entered into an agreement on October 4, 2021 with Antara Luxury River Cruises (a unit of M/s Heritage River Cruises Pvt Ltd) for promotion, marketing and selling of signature river cruise packages offered by the luxury cruise liner on the river Ganga. The company is one of leading river cruise operator in the country with a sailing experience of more than 20 years on in-land waterways of the country.
The luxury cruise liner Antara Ganges Voyager has a passenger capacity of 58 guests and houses 26 Deluxe Cabins and 2 Suites across its three decks aesthetically designed for providing extreme comfort to the guests during the cruise. Besides, providing world class accommodation, the cruise liner is also equipped with state of art restaurant, bar, fitness centre, spa and sundeck.
The cruise liner will start its first journey in the present season on November 26 on the 2 Nights and 3 Days River Sutra itinerary in Ganges. The cruise liner will leave from Kolkata and cover the culturally enriched destinations of Phulia, Bansberia and Chandernagore in the state of West Bengal and will finally return back to Kolkata. The itinerary itself has been crafted in such a way so as to represent the amalgamation of age old traditional Bengali culture and European colonial era. The itinerary will have 2 fixed departures every month till March 2022.
The special cruise itinerary which includes accommodation, all meals, transfers, sightseeing activities and entrance fees has been attractively priced starting at Rs. 31,500/- per person inclusive of taxes. The details of the itinerary with inclusion and exclusion are available on the tourism portal of IRCTC www.irctctourism.com .
Besides, the regular itinerary, IRCTC is also offering charter of the entire ship on exclusive customized itineraries ranging from 2 to 7 nights on mutually agreed terms and conditions. IRCTC is planning to launch joint promotion and marketing campaigns with other river cruise operators also to promote in-land water tourism in the country.
