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Despite an improvement in 2023, foreign tourist arrivals in India have remained well below pre-pandemic levels, and industry bodies believe this is mainly due to the lack of aggressive international brand marketing of Indian tourism and the absence of tourism offices in key markets.
The Federation of Associations of Indian Tourism and Hospitality (FAITH) and the Association of Indian Tour Operators (IATO) also say that allocation for tourism has been cut in the Union Budget.
The total allocation for the Union Tourism Ministry in the budget presented in July was marginally increased to ₹2,479 crore in 2024-25 compared to ₹2,400 crore in 2023-24, with the revised estimate for the year 2023-24 being ₹1,692 crore.
Although there is a significant increase in the number of foreign tourists visiting India to 9.23 million in 2023 (as per industry estimates), compared to 6.44 million in 2022, the numbers are still lower than pre-pandemic levels.
In 2018 and 2019, India received 10.56 million and 10.93 million foreign tourist arrivals, respectively, which declined to 2.74 million in 2020 and 1.52 million in 2021, mainly due to the Covid-induced lockdown.
According to IATO President Rajiv Mehra, while everyone expects foreign tourist numbers to increase, the real story is different. “This year’s numbers may be better than 2023, but they will not reach 2019 levels.”
“We live in a competitive world. Our neighbouring countries like Sri Lanka, Thailand are luring international tourists with free visas, cheap air fares, competitive hotel room rates and they promote themselves heavily in their source markets. Unfortunately, we do not match them on any of these parameters,” he said.
Mr Mehta said the incentives given to tour operators to promote India are almost negligible. “We have cut the tourism budget, which was meant for our embassies to promote India abroad,” he said.
Ashish Gupta, CEO, FAITH Consulting, says the main reason for the lower numbers compared to pre-pandemic years is the lack of aggressive international brand marketing of Indian tourism and the absence of tourism offices in key markets.
He said, “It is important to launch an intensive digital-based tourism marketing campaign showcasing Incredible India and its key sectors (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions (MICE), Adventure, Heritage). Promoting the presence of tourism specialist officials in key tourism markets to interact with the local travel trade and measures such as free visas for key source markets will be an added incentive.”
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