August 8: The number of tourists visiting Nepal in the first six months of 2017 has increased by 32 percent compared to the corresponding period of the previous year.

This year, a total of 475,269 tourists arrived in Nepal in between January to June, according to the Department of Immigration. During the corresponding period of last year, only 359,672 tourists had arrived in Nepal. In terms of number, there has been an increase of 115,597 tourists during the review period.

Maximum number of tourists arriving in Nepal were from India followed by China in the second place. The top ten countries sending tourists to Nepal including the two neighbouring countries are the USA, the UK, Thailand, Sri Lanka, South Korea, Australia, Germany and Japan.

The total number of Indian tourists visiting Nepal this year was 93,049 while the number of Chinese tourist was 54,090. Likewise, 41,091 American tourists visited Nepal while the number of visitors from the UK was 27,444 and from Thailand was 22,095.