The Nepali Embassy in New Delhi has invited Indian vloggers, YouTubers, podcasters and digital content creators to visit Nepal on a ‘familiarization trip’ to promote Nepal’s tourism.

The embassy has taken this initiative as a public and cultural diplomacy campaign to dispel the misleading information being spread in the Indian media about visiting Nepal.

On May 20, the Nepali Embassy in New Delhi had invited Indian social influencers through social media X to apply for the trip by May 30.

The embassy said that it had received an enthusiastic response from Indian mainstream media and social media influencers a week before the deadline.

Five-star hotels and airlines in Kathmandu have shown interest in supporting the selected Indian social media influencers by providing packages.

‘We have received over 200 applications in three days, and the number is increasing,’ said Surendra Thapa, acting ambassador of the Nepali Embassy in New Delhi. ‘We expect to receive over 1,000 applications by May 30.’

According to him, Indian social media users and influencers are spreading the message of the embassy through various platforms including Facebook, Reels and Instagram. This is the first time that the Nepal government has invited Indian social media influencers to visit Nepal to promote tourism. Five people will be selected from the applications.

The Nepal Tourism Board will take them on a tour of various locations in Kathmandu, Pokhara and Chitwan, where they will experience the diverse tourism potential of Nepal.

According to the embassy, ​​the selection will be based on the relevance of the content, quality of past work, audience reach and engagement, creativity, storytelling ability, professional reputation and ability to communicate effectively with an Indian audience in English, Hindi or an Indian regional language.

Nepal hopes to promote its natural beauty, cultural heritage, spiritual sites, hospitality and easy travel to remote areas through social media influencers, vloggers and YouTubers with millions of followers. The embassy statement said, “This visit will help produce engaging digital content and encourage Indian tourists to come to Nepal for entertainment, pilgrimage, culture, adventure tourism, wellness and family trips.”

Earlier, the Nepal government had also brought mainstream Indian journalists to Nepal on ‘familiarization trips’ on a few occasions. But that program was stopped years ago.

Those visits usually involved meetings with Nepali political leaders and officials, and then content focused on social and political issues was published in mainstream Indian media.

While the embassy was planning such visits, Indian television channel Zee News and other media outlets claimed that Nepal had implemented new travel rules for Indian tourists, making a valid identity card mandatory for entry and limiting the stay to 30 days.

“Nepali authorities said the new rules were introduced to improve border management and strengthen tourist surveillance. The decision is expected to affect regular passengers, pilgrims and tourists coming to Nepal from different parts of India,” said a news report still available on the social media channel Reality Sikkim.

The news spread rapidly, causing concern in both New Delhi and Kathmandu. Zee News later removed the news at the request of Nepali officials.

As many social influencers have expressed interest in visiting Nepal, the embassy plans to prepare a list of them and gradually send them to Nepal in different groups. “Many Indians believed the Indian media’s travel ban rumors after the Nepal government decided to tighten its borders and impose a tax on purchases of goods worth more than Rs 100,” said an official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

According to embassy officials, an opportunity to promote Nepal emerged on May 11 after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged citizens to postpone unnecessary foreign trips and weddings to prevent foreign exchange outflow. Modi urged people to reduce their gold purchases, use of foreign luxury goods, and fuel consumption.

The Iran war has reduced India’s foreign exchange reserves along with rising prices. India imports about (80-90 percent) of its total consumption of petrol from abroad. Gas and fertilizers also have to be imported in large quantities. Hence, India has recently adopted a policy of conserving foreign exchange to save its economy.

 “We decided to use this opportunity because Indian citizens do not need US dollars to come to Nepal, do not need a visa and can easily use their own currency and digital payment systems,” Thapa said. As per the bilateral arrangement, digital payments of up to 25,000 Indian rupees can also be made in Nepal through UPI. Indian citizens do not need a visa to visit Nepal.

Not only Nepal, countries including Thailand, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Uganda and Turkey have also started inviting social influencers to promote tourism. Such programs are often called ‘fam trips’ (familiarization trips) or influencer marketing campaigns, where content creators are provided with free or sponsored travel in exchange for producing content.

Many Indian social media creators were promoting Nepali tourist destinations even before Nepal formally invited influencers at their expense.

For example, Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer Sonal Goyal, who has over 528,000 followers on X, visited Namche Bazaar and Khumjung village in the Everest region and even tagged the Nepali embassy in her posts.