Ahmed Hamed Sharbak of Visit Qatar outlines a strategy centred on family travel, business mobility, sports tourism, stopovers and stronger people-to-people connections between India and Qatar.
For Qatar, the next phase of its tourism relationship with India is not simply about bringing more Indian visitors to Doha. It is about encouraging them to stay longer, experience more and increasingly see Qatar as a destination in its own right.
That was the central message from Ahmed Hamed Sharbak, Regional Manager – APAC, Visit Qatar, at the WION ICONIC Tourism Summit in New Delhi, where he spoke about the opportunities to deepen travel and tourism flows between the two countries.
Speaking during the session on the business of travel, Sharbak pointed to the longstanding relationship between India and Qatar and argued that tourism can become an even stronger dimension of those ties.
“Between Qatar and India, we have a long history between both countries,” he said, highlighting the depth of the relationship and the existing connections between their people and businesses.
But for Sharbak, history is only the starting point. The opportunity now is to translate those longstanding links into greater movement of people.
“We want more collaboration between both countries,” he said, identifying family leisure and business travel as two important areas where Qatar wants to see greater engagement.
From connectivity to experience
India is already an important market for Qatar, supported by strong aviation links and extensive business and people-to-people connections. Sharbak’s proposition, however, goes beyond connectivity.
The objective is to turn the ease of reaching Qatar into a reason to experience the country.
He spoke about the growing importance of attracting Indian families, encouraging them not simply to pass through Qatar but to discover what the destination offers.
This is particularly relevant to Qatar’s positioning as a stopover destination. For Indian travellers flying onwards to Europe, the United Kingdom or North America, Doha can form part of the journey rather than merely being the point of transit.
Sharbak highlighted the possibility of 48- or 72-hour stopovers, giving travellers an opportunity to experience Qatar even when it is not their primary holiday destination.
“For 48 hours or 72 hours, they can get a type of experience,” he explained, stressing that the proposition is particularly relevant for families travelling with children.
The strategy effectively seeks to turn Qatar’s geographical and aviation advantages into a tourism opportunity: a traveller heading from India to another part of the world can add a short Qatar experience without necessarily restructuring the entire holiday.
The family traveller
Family travel emerged as a particularly important part of Sharbak’s vision for the Indian market.
Rather than treating the Indian traveller as a single demographic, the approach is centred on creating experiences that work for different members of a family.
For Qatar, that means combining hospitality, attractions, entertainment, food, shopping, culture and events into an experience that can appeal across generations.
The emphasis also reflects a wider change in Indian outbound tourism. Indian travellers are increasingly looking for experiences rather than simply ticking destinations off a list. Qatar’s challenge and opportunity is to make Doha and the wider country sufficiently compelling for families to choose it as a destination, even when they may initially have been travelling elsewhere.
Sharbak also stressed the importance of the quality of the overall journey from the moment a traveller boards the aircraft to the time they arrive at the destination and experience its hotels, restaurants and attractions.
Sports tourism as a new magnet
One of Qatar’s strongest tools for attracting international visitors is its growing portfolio of major sporting events.
The country has already established itself as a major international sports destination, and Sharbak pointed to sports tourism as an important part of Qatar’s proposition for Indian visitors.
He specifically highlighted the Formula 1 event scheduled for November 2026, inviting Indian travellers to experience the event in Qatar.
The attraction of sports tourism, he suggested, lies in its ability to create a clear reason to travel. Instead of marketing a destination in abstract terms, a major sporting event gives visitors a specific occasion around which they can build a holiday.
This approach also fits into Qatar’s wider events strategy. Visit Qatar maintains an events calendar spanning sports, entertainment, culture, exhibitions, festivals and family activities, providing destinations and travel partners with a constantly changing set of reasons for visitors to travel.
Putting Qatar’s events calendar to work
Sharbak also referred to the launch of Qatar’s events calendar for 2027, describing it as a platform that allows travellers to see what is happening in the country and plan their visits around those events.
The idea is simple but commercially significant: give travellers a reason to come at a particular time.
For Indian visitors, this can create opportunities around sporting events, concerts, cultural programmes, exhibitions and family entertainment, allowing tourism campaigns to become more event-led and experience-led.
This is particularly relevant for short-break travel. A 48-hour or three-day trip can become much more attractive when it coincides with a major event.
Making stopovers a destination experience
Stopover tourism is perhaps the most distinctive part of the proposition.
Qatar sits naturally on major international air routes, and its aviation connectivity gives it access to travellers who may not originally have selected Doha as their holiday destination.
Sharbak’s argument is that this existing flow should be converted into tourism demand.
An Indian traveller heading towards Europe, the UK or North America could spend two or three days in Qatar before continuing the journey.
That changes the definition of the Qatar holiday. It does not necessarily have to compete with a longer European or North American itinerary; instead, Qatar can become an additional experience within it.
For families in particular, this can provide a relatively compact introduction to the destination.
Visa facilitation and ease of travel
Ease of entry is another important component of Qatar’s tourism proposition.
Visit Qatar’s current visa guidance lists India among the nationalities covered by its visitor-entry arrangements, with eligibility and conditions depending on the traveller’s circumstances. Qatar’s official tourism platform says citizens of more than 102 countries are eligible for free visa-on-arrival entry, while other visitors can use the Hayya platform for tourist visas.
This kind of facilitation can be particularly relevant to Indian travellers who are increasingly making decisions closer to departure and comparing destinations on convenience as well as experience.
The broader message from Sharbak was that connectivity, entry requirements and destination experiences need to work together.
A flight alone does not create a tourism relationship. The destination has to provide a reason to get off the aircraft.
A two-way tourism relationship
Sharbak’s comments also reflected the broader nature of India–Qatar economic relations.
Tourism is not an isolated sector. Business travel, investment, aviation, hospitality and people-to-people links overlap considerably between the two countries.
Qatar has significant business links with India, while Indian companies and professionals have a substantial presence in Qatar. This creates a natural base for combining business and leisure travel.
Sharbak therefore sees the opportunity as extending beyond traditional holiday tourism.
Business travellers can become leisure travellers. Families can discover Qatar while visiting relatives. Stopover passengers can become repeat visitors. Major events can introduce first-time travellers to the destination.
In this sense, the tourism relationship can reinforce the broader bilateral relationship.
Beyond the perception of the transit hub
Perhaps the most important shift in Qatar’s strategy is conceptual.
For many international travellers, Doha may first be associated with aviation connectivity. Sharbak’s comments point towards a deliberate effort to change that perception.
Qatar wants travellers to see the country not merely as a place where they change aircraft, but as a destination where they can spend time, create memories and experience something distinctive.
For the Indian market, this means communicating Qatar through experiences — family holidays, sporting events, food, culture, hospitality and short breaks — rather than relying solely on its role as an aviation hub.
The strategy also comes at a time when Indian outbound travel is becoming increasingly experience-driven and diverse.
The next chapter
The India–Qatar tourism relationship already rests on strong foundations: air connectivity, business ties, a large Indian community in Qatar and longstanding bilateral relations.
The next stage, according to Sharbak, is about converting those foundations into a deeper tourism corridor.
That means attracting more families, encouraging more business and leisure travel, using major events to generate demand, promoting stopovers and making the destination experience itself the centre of the proposition.
Qatar’s message to the Indian traveller is consequently becoming broader. Do not just fly through Doha. Stop. Stay. Experience it.
For a country with strong aviation connectivity and an expanding calendar of international events, the challenge now is to turn that message into sustained travel flows and to make Qatar an intentional part of the Indian traveller’s itinerary rather than simply a convenient point on the route.
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