indianotes

Tourism is never long out of the news. But this news coverage seems to be stuck in a loop – at least for the last 40-odd years since I started reading business news.

The loop consists of the following elements:

• Tourism is desirable, as it generates significant employment and earns dollars, with low investment levels. (In recent days, tourism is being touted as a band-aid to tariff tantrums).
• We have a significantly large number of beaches, mountains, nature reserves, monuments, historic sites and all the nice things that tourists like to visit.
• However, international tourists refuse to show up, and the growth of outbound tourism outpaces domestic. Small countries with a fraction of India’s attractions get way more foreign tourists.
• So we must increase advertising! The world needs to know about the wonders that we have. Let’s hire Mr. Bachchan to woo the Europeans!

And if it’s not advertising, then poor infrastructure (airports and hotels) is blamed. And much of the institutional efforts are spent on addressing these.

While these initiatives are good, the real problem lies in the overall “quality” of India’s tourism product.

Airports often matter less than making the tourist’s life easier. A few examples:

Getting a taxi at most Indian airports is a nightmare. No proper signage, no clarity on fares, poor-quality vehicles, and confusion at airport exit points. Instead of orderly queues, cab touts hang around hustling visitors. At Pune airport, getting a cab often takes longer than your actual flight!

The same with railway stations. In Mumbai, at the major stations CST and Dadar, you cannot get a cab! Period! Compare this with most European or East Asian cities. There is an orderly system, one waits for a few minutes, gets transport and can easily reach one’s destination – and with transparent pricing.

The lack of pavements is another huge problem. This may seem trivial, but it is not. Tourists don’t have their own vehicles and use public transport or walk. Given the state (or non-existence) of public transport in Indian towns – tourists have no choice but to walk. Yet, there is no space to walk.

Pedestrians have to jump over gutters, manholes, puddles and random rubbish. After navigating the worst of these, they start congratulating themselves, only to find that their left leg is stuck in dog poop. Welcome to Incredible India!

In the meantime, aggressive taxi drivers are trying to run them down or deafen them with horns. This out-of-control traffic is worsened by local tourists bringing their SUVs to tourist spots. Incessant honking and pollution, traffic jams and yes, incessant honking.

And last, but definitely not least, is hygiene. Overflowing sewers, garbage thrown around, plastic in the rivers and on beaches, dirty toilets….. you get the picture! One of the biggest boosts to tourism would be to implement Swacch Bharat, rather than spending on advertising “Incredible India”.

I’ve been fortunate to travel to several countries, and walking is easy, safe and enjoyable. No honking, and clean pavements. In fact, city centers are often devoid of cars. All this enhances the “quality” of the experience.

Interestingly, this will not benefit only the tourists. Benefits to locals would be even greater. Imagine clean streets, pavements we can actually use and no honking. Heck! Our cities might actually become livable again!

Our governments (and Mr Modi) now need to think of “Ease of doing tourism” as a key benchmark.