The Indian Minister of State for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation, H.E. Dr. Mahesh Sharma, paid a courtesy call on President James Michel at State House this afternoon.

During his visit to Seychelles, the Minister attended the Seychelles-India Day celebrations.

President Michel attended the opening ceremony on Friday at the International Conference Centre and praised this year’s events as an excellent, beautiful and cohesive expression of the multiethnic nature of Seychelles and Indian societies.

“The Seychelles India Day is an excellent opportunity to celebrate the natural affinities and the long-standing relations and friendship between our two countries and peoples. It is a demonstration of our mutual and common determination to continue to work together for progress and development,” said President Michel during the meeting.

They discussed several ways that India and Seychelles can work together to promote tourism and cultural relations and noted that great progress had already been made in these two fields.

The upcoming India-Africa Summit in Delhi, India, in October, was also a subject of discussion. President Michel has been invited by Prime Minister Modi to attend the gathering alongside other African heads of state.

“... With tourism, culture and civil aviation, there is a lot of potential of these sorts of exchanges and the increase of bilateral tourism, increasing the connectivity... and we propose to send a group of media personnel and tour operators to this country, to learn how beautifully they have managed the coastal side of tourism industry... We have rich cultural relations with each other,” said Minister Sharma during an interview with the press.

Also present in the meeting were the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Transport, Mr. Joel Morgan, the Minister for Tourism and Culture, Mr. Alain St. Ange, the President’s Diplomatic Adviser, Ambassador Callixte d’Offay, the Indian High Commissioner to Seychelles, Mr. Sanjay Panda, the Officer on Special Duty to the Minister of State, Mr. Navneet Soni and the First Secretary of the Indian High Commission in Seychelles, Mr. A Banerjee.