Thiruvananthapuram, May 18 (PTI): Kerala Tourism’s Facebook page has garnered 1.5 million likes to emerge on top among the states in the country in 2017.

The God’s Own Country, bestowed with enchanting backwaters, virgin beaches and high ranges, pushed Jammu and Kashmir and Gujarat Tourism’s Facebook pages to the second and third place respectively, an official press release said here on Thursday.

The ranking was done by Facebook based on total engagement with tourists that included reactions, shares and comments on the page between the January 1 and December 31, 2017.

The Kerala Tourism Facebook page had garnered 1.5 million likes to emerge as the top, the release said.

Facebook recently released the data on the top-ranked Facebook pages of government bodies, ministries and political parties in the country.

Kerala Tourism Director P Bala Kiran received an award in this connection at the Facebook office in New Delhi from the social media site’s Public Policy Manager (India, South and Central Asia) Nitin Saluja.

Tourism Minister Kadakampally Surendran congratulated the entire team for the achievement.

“Kerala Tourism has been able to successfully convey the reasons as to why Kerala is a destination that should be on every traveller’s itinerary,” Tourism Secretary, Rani George was quoted as having said in the release.

The department’s presence on social media had taken this message across to millions across the world and the laurel from Facebook was heartening, she added.

Kiran said Kerala Tourism’s activity on Facebook and other social media space had been focused and proactive. It has been able to keep travellers from India and abroad engaged with interesting and innovative posts on the projects and activities undertaken by the department.

The ranking comes at a time when Kerala Tourism had upped the Digital marketing budget to 15 per cent and been communicating to the people across the globe in “exciting ways”, he said.