Domestic Tourism Sector Neglected
Dr Sunder Ram Korivi
Tourism is closely connected with real estate since it involves enjoyment of the pleasures of natural beauty of landscapes in an experiential manner. Commercially, hotels build around the concept of ‘rent’ and are referred to as ‘properties’ or investments.
There is a mistaken notion that tourism is only about hotels and ticketing. In fact, tourism marketing is all about getting tourists interested in a destination. This is the destination marketing part. Prior to this is the destination management and planning for the supporting infrastructure and its maintenance. Once the tourists arrive, there is the logistics and food. Other service opportunities include entertainment, sale of handicrafts, souvenirs, etc, all of which go under the ‘experience’ effect.
The tourism sector is generally recognized as one of the largest employers in many economies, following the construction, automobile and textile sectors. Tourism, as a sector, has several sub-divisions ranging from hotels, transport and other travel related services.
The Indian economy has done well in managing during the downturn of 2008. This is because of the reduced dependence on exports. The same can be said of the India tourism sector also. International travellers can be fickle. Consider the events like the SARS (bird flu) virus, and other incidents where international tourists gave India the miss even though India was not even remotely affected. On the other hand, consider the burgeoning rise of domestic tourism.
Domestic tourism is on the rise due to a demographic and lifestyle shift. Gone are the days when the annual outing involved visiting relatives. Today, family members express the need to get away to a newer destination on each holiday.
Pointers for the potential for domestic tourism
1. The concept of ‘only one annual holiday’ has now give way to summer, Diwali, Christmas, monsoon, and even weekend getaways.
2. A large and growing upwardly mobile population does not mind travelling domestically by air, or by air-conditioned train, bus or car. Of course, there is an even larger population consisting of those who will continue to travel in ordinary second class train and non air-conditioned buses.
3. Hitherto, most families had a single bread-earner. Today, there are multiple bread earners and also multiple sources of income for families. Coupled with the ease of payment such as cheques, credit cards, debit cards and ATM machines; the funding of travel becomes much easier.
4. Media coverage to travel and trade has also expanded considerably. There is a proliferation of newspapers, with many having a travel and leisure section. Television channels such as Discovery Travel & Living and programmes by other channels kindle the travel instincts of interested persons. To this is the formidable tool of the internet which is being increasingly harnessed.
5. India offers a wide repertoire of tourism spots such as beaches, mountains, forests, wildlife. This can also be classified as leisure, adventure, water sports, religious (pilgrimage), historical and cultural tourism. Thus, the range already exists to serve every palate.
6. Tourism is one sector where there is no threat of substitutes (China cannot replicate the Taj Mahal, nor Indian cuisine).
7. The multi-lingual skills of Indians could be of use both as a tourist as well as a tourism-service provider, especially since tourism is a service industry.
8. Tourism is ideally poised to bridge the rural-urban divide or the farm-versus-city divide. It is integrative in nature and promotes peace and understanding.
With so much at stake, it is how domestic tourism has failed to attract the attention of policy-makers, especially since international tourism has vanished with the poor economic prospects looming on the rest of the world. With the Indian economy insulated from the rest of the world, stimulating tourism could trigger cascading income-generating activities for tour operators, tour promoters, travel agents, conductors, translators/interpreters, drivers, porters, guides, sellers of books and handicrafts, artistes etc. This is apart from the hotels and transport operators.
With the potential of serving almost a billion people, the Indian tourism sector is too important to ignore, and to leave to chance for unorganized development.
Consider the continuing existence of the following impediments:
• The tourism sector is one of the heavily taxed sectors. This includes sales tax, luxury tax, service tax, permit fees, cess, entry tax etc, to name a few. Besides, service providers incur custom duty, excise, VAT and other imposts which are passed on to their clients. Apart from the taxes collected, assesses are subject to harassment by inspectors, apart from the tedium of record keeping involved.
• Tourism is viewed as a sector in which the traveller can be milked. Aside from taxes, there are instances of overcharging, cheating, theft etc. For instance, the auto-rickshaw drivers in Chennai and Pune and taxi drivers in Delhi have been fleecing tourists for decades. It is difficult to believe that all this is done without the tacit support of the local police. There is sheer lack of political will.
• Poor infrastructure – physical as well as soft. Physical infrastructure includes roads, transport and power. Soft infrastructure includes specific information booths, better displays and signboards, quality of announcements made at stations and airports and training in etiquette both for tourists as well as service providers.
Considering the enormous potential for domestic tourism and its effectiveness in kick-starting the domestic economy, it is too important to leave its development to mere chance. Apart from fiscal incentives, the removal of disincentives and impediments are steps that need to be taken in right earnest.
