Novotel is a mid-scale hotel brand within the Accor group. Novotel has close to 400 hotels and resorts in 60 countries, situated in the business districts and tourist destinations of major international cities.

Novotel opened its first hotel in 1967, offering 62 rooms, 25m² in size, all of the same design with private bathrooms, a television and telephone, together with meeting facilities, a swimming pool, air-conditioning and private parking.

Novotel worldwide :

As of 2009, there are 395 Novotel hotels in 60 countries with 71 872 rooms and employs over 30,000 employees:

Novotel hotels feature a bedroom measuring 25m², restaurant and bar in all hotels, meeting facilities, fitness rooms, swimming pools, terraces, green spaces and internet access. Some hotels also have larger executive rooms and suites.

Novotel hotels are involved in the worldwide environmental and societal certification programme EarthCheck. As of the 22nd of May 2012, 278 hotels are committed, 134 hotels are benchmarked and 109 are certified.

Rajiv Ratna Gandhi /ˈrɑːdʒiːv ˈɡɑːndiː/ ( pronunciation (help·info); 20 August 1944 – 21 May 1991) was the sixth Prime Minister of India (1984–1989). He took office after his mother's assassination on 31 October 1984; he himself was assassinated on 21 May 1991. He became the youngest Prime Minister of India when he took office at the age of 40.

Rajiv Gandhi was the eldest son of Indira and Feroze Gandhi. He went to study at Trinity College, Cambridge, and later at Imperial College London, but did not complete a degree at either. At Cambridge he met the Italian-born Antonia Albina Maino, then a waitress in a restaurant, whom he later married. After dropping out of university, he became a professional pilot for Indian Airlines. He remained aloof from politics, despite his family's political prominence. It was only following the death of his younger brother Sanjay Gandhi in 1980 that Rajiv entered politics. Following the assassination of his mother in 1984 after Operation Blue Star, the Indian National Congress party leaders nominated him to be Prime Minister.