The Hindu : Gujarat violence hits foreign tourist arrivals

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Apr 11, 2002

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Gujarat violence hits foreign tourist arrivals

By Gargi Parsai

New Delhi April 10. The violence in Gujarat and its extensive coverage in the foreign media have hit foreign tourist arrivals to the country. Latest figures with the Ministry of Tourism show nearly a 15 per cent decline in the tourist arrivals during January to March this year over last year. In value terms, there has been an 11.8 per cent fall in foreign exchange earnings through tourism during this period over last year.

In any case, there was a 4.2 per cent decline in foreign tourist arrivals during last year over the previous year. In 2000, about 2.6 million tourists visited India. This dropped to 2.5 million in 2001, making the unannounced target of five million tourist arrivals a "distant dream'', though China recently signed an MoU with India, adding the latter among "preferred destinations''.

The incidence of plague in Himachal Pradesh — though contained — followed by the communal violence in Gujarat could not have happened at a worse time as India is preparing to host the 51st annual conference of the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA).

The Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, is to inaugurate it here on Sunday to which about 900 foreign delegates have been invited.

Already the September 11 and December 13 incidents have impacted tourism. Even before the sector could recover from the global industrial recession and the fall in tourist traffic, sporadic incidents of plague and Gujarat happened.

Still, with Jagmohan at the helm of affairs of the Ministry, for the first time, the Finance Minister has increased the allocation by 50 per cent and announced schemes for the development of tourism in his budget estimates.

To rationalise taxes, the Government has lowered taxes on imported liquor and waived luxury and service tax on catering in hotels. A National Tourism Policy with linkages to cultural sites is on the anvil. The Ministry is now working on developing six tourist circuits at an estimated cost of Rs. 41 crores. The Tourism Secretary, Rathi Vinay Jha, said on Wednesday that the Ministry would be the nodal one for convergence with other departments and State Governments for development of infrastructure and roads at these circuits. The circuits are Bodh Gaya (Rajgir-Nalanda-Varanasi); Buddhist Monastic (Kullu-Manali- Lahul-Spiti-Leh); Gujarat (Dholavira-Rajkot-Dwarka-Porbunder-Somnath-Girnar-Palitana- Ahmedabad); South Heritage (Chennai-Mahaballipuram - Kanchipuram-Thiruvanamonalai-Ginjee-Pondicherry); Kerala (Palakkad-Kochi-Kottayam (Kumarakom)-Thiruvanthapuram); and the Northeastern circuit (Guwahati-Kaziranga-

Shillong-Tawang.)

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