Categories: Travel

Pradeep Shetty elected President, Nirav Gandhi becomes Hony Secretary, ET TravelWorld

(L-R) Pradeep Shetty & Sudesh Poddar.

The Federation of Hotel & Restaurant Associations of India (FHRAI) held its 67th Annual General Meeting on September 28 in New Delhi and elected its new team. During the meeting, Pradeep Shetty, Director, Maharaja Hotels in Mumbai, has been unanimously elected as the new President. He will take charge of the office from January 1, 2024.

Before this, Shetty held the position of Vice President and has been an actively engaged member of the association for more than a decade. He currently also serves as the President of the Hotel and Restaurant Association of Western India (HRAWI), where he took charge earlier this week after AGM.

The Executive Committee also elected the new ‘Office Bearers’ of FHRAI, who supervise the routine affairs at the Federation. Surendra Kumar Jaiswal, K Nagaraju, and TS Walia were elected as the Vice Presidents from Hotel & Restaurant Association of Northern India (HRANI), The South India Hotels & Restaurants Association (SIHRA), and Hotel & Restaurant Association of Eastern India (HRAEI), respectively. DVS Somaraju has been elected as Hony Treasurer and Nirav Gandhi as the Hony Secretary, while Sudesh Kumar Poddar and Amarvir Singh will serve as Jt Hony Secretaries of the Federation. FHRAI said Shetty’s knowledge in corporate law, coupled with his deep understanding of the legal and regulatory ecosystem for the tourism and hospitality business, has been instrumental in FHRAI’s legal interventions for almost a decade. Some of the significant achievements of FHRAI that reflect his commitment to fight for the benefit of the hospitality industry are the MRP judgement of the Supreme Court, CCI’s order against the anti-competitive practices of MakeMyTrip and OYO, the famous Cable TV tariff relief against Broadcasters, and the Delhi High Court order staying the CCPA guidelines against levying of service charge.

The members of the association in Himachal said that the hotel industry is struggling with maintenance expenses and lease payments. They added that a reduction in electricity charges for six months, as was done during the Covid-19 pandemic, and a discount on water and garbage charges would be a big relief.

“As the President of FHRAI, I am committed to addressing several pressing priorities with a sense of urgency. We intend to actively engage with the Government in creating a more conducive regulatory framework for the hospitality sector, and the long-pending request of the sector for granting infrastructure status is top of our agenda. This can be a game-changer by facilitating long-term loans at competitive interest rates to accelerate growth in the sector. More stimulus packages and incentives are required from the government to equip the sector to achieve the ambitious target of welcoming 100 million international tourists by 2047, which includes a favourable GST regime and ease of Doing Business measures in hospitality,” said Shetty sharing his reaction.

Among other important challenges of the industry, Shetty said he has been pursuing concerns over music copyright matters, service charge matters, and anti-competitive activities by big tech companies, which are adversely affecting the members of the Federation.