Curtains go up on 10th vegetable show at Kotagiri

UDHAGAMANDALAM: Tourism minister

Vellamandi N Natarajan

inaugurated the 10th vegetable show at the

Nehru Park

at

Kotagiri

here on Saturday, adding more colour to the on-going summer festival.

The main attraction of the show was a huge structure of Nandhi, which was made of 500kg brinjal. Visitors were also taken up by the other structures made of a variety of vegetables. Cultural programmes were too part of the show, which would conclude on Sunday.

At the event, Nilgiri Documentation Centre (NDC) made a representation to the minister urging to set up a high-level committee to prepare a long term master plan for promoting tourism in Nilgiris.

“Tourist inflow to Nilgiris is expected to touch 50 lakh in a few years from more than 30 lakh now. The hill station should be accordingly prepared to handle the increasing footfall,” said Dharmalingam Venugopal, director, Nilgiri Documentation Centre.

It also asked the government to convene a global meeting of NRI Tamils to promote tourism infrastructure and attractions, including roads, tunnels, theme parks, museums and resorts, in Nilgiris and other parts of the state.

“To commemorate the 200th year of modern Nilgiris, we request the chief minister to set up an international medical facility, college and hospital at the space vacated by the Hindustan Photo Films. The medical facility, named after the late J Jayalalithaa, should have all types of Indian medicine as well as Chinese medicine and sports medicine,” the representation read.