In line with international best practices in the hotel industry, the government has now made it mandatory for all hotels to become differently abled-friendly.
Existing and new hotels of all categories all over the country would now have to comply with the requirements for the differently abled persons in respect of accessibility, special rooms with bathrooms and facilities in the public area by September 1, 2010, according to the revised guidelines.
Tourism ministry has tried to address major concerns to make the classification norms friendlier for differently abled persons by adopting the international best practices, an official release said.
In order to keep abreast with the contemporary requirements of the hospitality industry, Ministry has recently reviewed the norms for approval of hotel projects and guidelines for classification of hotels.
The changing requirements of international and domestic travellers clubbed with emeging safety and security consciousness in view of the recent incidents in the country necessiated a review of the hotel classification norms which were last reviewed in 2003.
These guidelines have been finalised by the tourism ministry after several rounds of interaction with and inputs from the hotel industry and the related stakeholders.
Revised guideline have also taken into account the issues regarding safety and security as per which depending on the star category hotels are now required to have metal detectors, CCTV, X-ray machines, under belly scanners to screen vehicles, verification of staff and suppliers.
Food and beverage outlets (restaurants) in the hotels have also been rationalised. For this purpose, the minimum number and type of restaurants have been allocated depending on the location of the hotel in the country based on a system of Grade A and Grade B cities.
The Grade A cities would comprise of major metropolitan cities like Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore, Pune, Hyderabad and Delhi.
Delhi would include the hotels located in Gurgaon, Faridabad, Ghaziabad, Noida and Greater Noida.
Grade B cities would comprise all other cities not covered in the Grade A. Hotels located in Grade A cities would require to offer more types of cuisine, number of food and beverages outlets compared to Grade B cities.
With a view to provide high standards of service, it has been made mandatory for hotels to have minimum percentage of trained supervisory and skilled staff possessing degree/diploma/skilled training certificate from central/state Institute of Hotel Management, Food Craft Institute, or from National Council for Hotel Management and Catering Technology affiliated or from other reputed hospitality schools.
Image: J W Marriott, Mumbai
