It is a well-accepted fact that one of biggest avenues to generate employment is Tourism. Worldwide, the tourism industry generates revenue of about $620 billion. Out of this, India's share is a paltry $5 billion or about 0.8% (2004 figures). In terms of numbers, out of worldwide tourists of about 760 million, India receives merely 3.4 million tourists. While larger countries like US of A (with 46 million tourist / $75 billion revenues) and the dirt-cheap China (with 42 million tourist / $26 billion revenues) benefit a lot through tourism, it is Europe's showpiece France that takes away the honours with the highest tourist inflow. It has a staggering 75 million tourists, which is nearly equal to its local population. In contrast, an International visitor to India has a 1000 Indian to greet him. While these figures cut a sorry figure, it also shows the tremendous potential that India holds for the tourism business. How then can we make India a tourist destination?
As in all spheres, 80% of the changes can be done by 20% effort, while remaining 20% may require a gargantuan effort. So let us look at the former only. The first step, and this may be the most difficult step, is to create an 'Impression'. What do I feel of say 'Singapore'? A neat and clean place. What about Malaysia? Its 'Truly Asia' campaign and its Petronas towers. Each country brings its showpiece, be it Great Pyramids or the Great Wall of China. What about India? What do others think about it? I don't know. But I don't have any great regard for this country. 'Shabby' and all-pervasive 'Shabbiness' - This is how I can summarize its public life. In films, they say that India is a land of snake charmers and bullock carts. Is it true? I don't know. But leading CEO's from Cisco, Siemens, and Virgin among many others frequent India seeking business opportunities. Poverty and underdevelopment is a truth, but it spells opportunity for many. Different people have different impressions about India, and let us leave it like that.
The next important item is 'Information'. For a change, India's official tourism website (incredibleindia.org) hosts in multiple languages including French, Spanish and Deutsch. Everyone wants to feel connected and this is a welcome change. But this is not enough. Every state has its own naming convention for websites. I tried searching for Taj Mahal and I could not get an authentic and genuine website. In contrast, search for Windsor Castle gave me a very good result. The bottom line is that in the myriad websites floated by travel agencies, the official state websites get lost. So the proposal is to have the main Indian website connect all the State tourism websites which have a uniform nomenclature. The website development could even be outsourced to third-party developers (e.g. Travel magazines) who could be paid on number of hits.
Information alone however has limited use. The next logical step is 'Booking'. Here, tourist would want online booking, e-auctions and attractive deals/discounts. While the trend towards this has started, poor Internet penetration and PC-usage is a major stumbling block. So, the next proposal is to rate all hotels and make it mandatory for all star-rated hotels and leading government hotels to compulsorily offer Internet-based booking. Talking about Internet bookings, not only lodging but travel also needs to be considered. A good development in this regard is the Internet-based air tickets. Leading private sector airlines Jet Airways and low-cost airlines Air Deccan now offer e-tickets through credit cards / online bank transfers. However, aviation capacity is limited and a very big chunk of travel in India takes place through rail or road. For railways too, IRCTC has started offering ticket booking facility through Internet. The growth has been good and even e-ticket concept for railways coming up. Bus travel is a complete laggard in this regard.
With good or bad impressions, normal or e-tickets, tourist have come. Now what are the challenges? Needless to say, the very first step, 'Air Travel', has now become the most harrowing one. Decrepit airports, arrogant custom officials and unscrupulous taxi drivers don't make life easy. The privatisation of Bangalore and Hyderabad airports has picked up, but Greenfield development of the major airports at Delhi and Mumbai may take ages. While leading airport developers of the world have shown interest, the snails pace and bureaucracy is not making life easy. Airport development should now be an item of highest priority. The government makes the right noises. But what materializes is totally different.
Like airports, the state of 'Public Transport' is no better. For most tourists, this is non-existent as basic necessities like AC is absent. The condition of roads and indiscipline traffic movement makes many wonder how the system works. While metro appears in pockets (that too only in Delhi and Kolkata), the only available option is private taxi. A comprehensive transportation policy that focuses on efficient, cheap and comfortable public travel, use of cleaner fuels like CNG and providing pedestrian-only zones is the need of the hour.
Among this mess, the 'Hotels' fare better. This is with the assumptions that the visitors can afford 5-star accommodation. A new trend now has been towards smaller hotels that do away with paraphernalia and grandeur of the bigger hotels, yet serve almost all the needs of the tourists. This trend will serve well, more so for the domestic traveller.
Another major sore point that is conspicuous by its absence is 'Night-life'. With no Casinos, the gambling instincts are put in tight leash. For the basic instincts too, there is nothing legal to boast and one has to play in the hands of pimps. It is common sense that restrictions only fuel desire without any commensurate benefits. In contrast, a free society seeks its own equilibrium.
While the above points relate to the general makeup of a country, what are the specific areas of growth for tourism? Few areas emerge clearly: Natural beauty, Religious tourism, Historical places, Adventure tourism and Medical tourism.
Given the vast expanse of India, from Kanyakumari to Himalayas, India's Natural Beauty is immense. However, one small visit to Shimla can corroborate how uncontrolled exploitation of nature causes intolerable damage. In the Hills, the main challenges include inadequate water supply, poor waste management, proliferating use of polythene bags and plastic bottles, narrow roads and lack of parking facilities. The holy place of Badrinath is a classic case where the residents do not have house to live as all houses are converted into dinghy hotels. The solution lies in controlled use of land where availability of hotel rooms limits the number of visitors preventing the choking of the infrastructure. If one moves to the Reserve Forests, an even bigger threat is there in the form of poaching. It is rumoured that all tigers of the Sariska tiger reserve have been shot. The situation in other tiger reserves may not be any better. While working groups are pressed to stem the rot, the threat is assuming menacing proportions. Down south, the beaches offer a potential. Among various options, the state of Goa remains a very popular spot, particularly so for the foreigners. The key to success lies in the relatively neat and clean state, easy-going people, nice accommodations, adequate water sports facilities, and even casinos. The state seems very unlike the India.
Apart from nature, Religious Tourism too offers tremendous scope. However, most of these places are in hills (like the 4 Dhams of Badrinath, Kedarnath, Gangotri and Jamnotri) or are small towns like Hardwar or Vrindavan, none of which are designed to carry the flux of visitors that come there. Smaller the place, worse is the accommodation. Limited availability of land makes development nearly impossible. The least that can be done is to terminate the cars at some distant location and offer ferry services so that the main centre is not clogged and people put greater use of their legs by walking.
Historical places, including the best-selling Taj Mahal, offer limitless opportunity. However, Agra, which earns lot of money through the Moghul monument, has very bad roads. A major development was planned for Taj Mahal, but it turned out to be a major scam and many leading politicians and bureaucrat went in the dock. Vested interests always cause harm than do any good.
A rather under-exploited field is Adventure Tourism. The potential for trekking, rock climbing, car rallying river rafting, ice skiing, paragliding and canoeing among others is there. But the biggest stumbling blocks here include lack of marketing and poor connectivity to the place under consideration. The solution here could like in hosting an array of big ticket events offering grand prizes. The prizes could even be sponsored by tourism budget. Not only would it create excitement, it would also cause awareness.
A recent development is Medical Tourism. Leading hospitals are doing it all along and offer cheaper medical treatments including Surgery, Bone Marrow Transplant, Cardiac Care and Dialysis and Kidney Transplant among others. The high cost differential makes the travel cost insignificant. Along with hospitals, what is also needed is service apartments that allow family members to living along with patients.
This column only touches a few things. The goldmine is there. It only needs to be tapped, properly and carefully.
Chachu 1/12/2005
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Web Resources
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http://www.incredibleindia.org/ (Govt. of India website to promote tourism)
http://www.incredibleindia.org/tourism2004.pdf (tourism statistics)
http://www.windsor.gov.uk/
http://www.ameinfo.com/39109.html
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