The central government has initiated the process of transferring four ITDC properties as part of disinvestment to state governments. Hotel Lalitha Mahal Palace (Mysore) will be transferred to Karnataka government, Hotel Jaipur Ashok to Rajasthan, Hotel Lake View Ashok (Bhopal) to Madhya Pradesh and Hotel Brahmaputra Ashok (Guwahati) to Assam government, Tourism Minister Mahesh Sharma informed Rajya Sabha in a written reply. Apart from these hotels, he said the government has decided to lease out or sell Hotel Kalinga Ashok (Bhubaneswar). India Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC), a public sector firm under Tourism Ministry, currently runs 16 hotels in Delhi, Patna, Jammu, Ranchi, Bhubaneswar, Puri, Bhopal, Bharatpur, Jaipur, Guwahati, Mysore, Puducherry and Itanagar. During the first NDA regime between 1999 and 2004, the then Vajpayee government had divested its stakes in 18 ITDC hotels, bringing down the number of state-run hotels from 34 to 16.