MAGAZINE Voices Pushpesh Pant Ravi Shankar Utkarsh Amitabh Ganesh Saili Preeti Shenoy Swami Sukhabodhananda Buffet People Wellness Books Food Art & Culture Entertainment NEW DELHI December 1 2024 SUNDAY PAGES 12 A Doom with a View Overtourism is killing local cultures, ecosystems and scenic beauty. India is facing a travel catastrophe of unmanageable proportions manali About 72.84 lakh incomers landed up in Manali last year I By Sneha Mahale n 2022, Kerala made it to the TIME magazine’s ‘50 extraordinary destinations to explore’. Just two years later, God’s Own Country is teeming with masses of tourists from across the country and the world. Consequently the state , has been included in Fodor’s Travel ‘No List 2025’—the global travel guide’s list of tourist destinations to avoid, citing “unsustainable tourism practices” and “mounting environmental challenges”. The southern state has also been categorised under ‘Destinations Beginning to Suffer’. Particularly highlighted were the catastrophic landslides in Wayanad this year, numerous landslide incidents between 2015 and 2022, and the alarming shrinking of Vembanad Lake; a Ramsar site—the Ramsar international environmental treaty aims to conserve wetlands and their resources—and the backbone of Kerala’s backwater tourism. Overtourism is the new torment of India, plunging popular travel destinations into an ecological and cultural nightmare. The pandemic of 2000 has a lot to answer for: revenge travel by Indians in 2021 meant 677 million domestic tourists spreading their air wings and stepping on the gas; a number that rose to 2,509.63 million in 2023. In Goa, where the population is around 1.6 million, the state had more than 8.5 million visitors in 2023. Imagine that. However, the number of its foreign tourists are down by 60 per cent. An influx of digital nomads has driven up prices. While the surge benefits certain businesses, locals are finding it increasingly difficult to afford living in their own communities. In 2018, India announced its plan to limit daily visitors to the Taj Mahal to 40,000 to preserve its iconic 17th-century structure. With millions of tourists visiting each year, the growing footfall was causing wear and tear on the white marble of the tomb. Experts warn that the crowds may cause strain to the monument’s foundations. Similarly overcrowding is common at Vrinda, van’s Banke Bihari temple, and has led to six deaths from 2021 to 2023 due to suffocation. The 161-year-old temple, which has a daily average footfall of 50,000 visitors, regularly sees crowds exceeding one lakh on weekends and over five lakh on festive days. In 2023, Joshimath, a gateway to pilgrimage sites like Badrinath and Hemkund Sahib, as well as a skiing hub for Auli, was declared a “sinking town” as buildings and roads cracked, leaving many areas uninhabitable. Experts attributed this crisis to rampant, unchecked development destabilising the region’s delicate ecology compounded by the , constant influx of tourists. Unchecked commercial development is also damaging sensitive regions. In places like Kasol, Himachal Pradesh, a rush to build homestays and resorts has driven up land prices, displacing locals and replacing natural landscapes with concrete monstrosities, causing deforestation and habitat disruption. In Coorg, renowned for its coffee estates and lush landscapes, rapid commercialisation has pushed local infrastructure to its limits. Here too, homestays and resorts are putting immense pressure on water resources. “Local farmers, like me, now face severe water shortage. The region has drought, which has been exacerbated by the tourism boom,” says Ankita Nanda, who runs a small coffee farm in the area. According to a 2018 study published in Nature, India ranks as the fourth-largest contributor to the global tourism carbon footprint, trailing only the US, China, and Germany To counter this, travel guilt . can maybe motivate tourists to adopt more conscientious behaviours. “However, it relies on both individual and societal awareness, alongside effective destination management that demands strategic leadership and governance,” explains Tanja Mihali, a professor at the School of Economics and the Business University of Ljubljana in Slovenia, and a former member of the World Committee on Tourism Ethics which works under the aegis of the World Tourism Organization. The choice is yours. STEERING THE NIGHtMARE: The adage across the world say the hills have memories. In tourist season, the 30-odd-km road from Dehradun to Mussoorie, once a sleepy verdant , colonial hill station built in 1823, is choked with traffic lines longer than the memory of its ancient ghosts Ruskin Bond is so fond of writing about. During peak season the police allow only about 2,000 vehicles to go up, unless the visitors have a confirmed hotel reservation. Religious travel has rocketed over the decade: last reported atal tunnel 28,210 vehicles passed through the Atal Tunnel around Christmas last year figures show 1,439 million tourists visited religious sites in India, including 6.64 million international visitors in 2022. This year, the Uttarakhand Tourism Department says 5,21,965 vehicles reached the four shrines of Char Dham by the end of pilgrimage season—mid-November. Of these, a significant number reached Badrinath and Gangotri directly raising , vehicular and noise pollution levels and littering the once-pristine region. Kedarnath Valley was tourist Ground Zero: the number of vehicles at 1,87,615 was nearly double from last year’s count of 88,236. This year, Gangotri was stormed by 8,18,273 outsiders and 88,236 vehicles. “The growing number of vehicles is damaging the Himalayan ecosystem seriously warns ,” historian and author Jai Singh Rawat. Read traffic jams, haphazard parking, garbage and carbon dioxide fumes. Vehicular pollution is the main villain in tourist destinations. The rise of adventure tourism in Ladakh has increased traffic in an area vulnerable to climate change. “With more and more tourists renting vehicles to navigate rugged terrain, local air quality has taken a hit,” says Stanzin, who runs a homestay near Leh. According to a 2021 study published in Frontiers in Earth Science, tourist vehicles “Overcrowding is having a major impact. The health of the Himalayas cannot be over looked just for the sake of tourism or pilgrimage.” Udit Ghildyal, Director, HIEED contribute significantly to black carbon deposits on glaciers, speeding up their melting. In Rishikesh, overtourism has stressed the fragile River Ganga ecosystem. “The link between climate change and last-chance tourism is clear. Sadly the media can’t make the same link , between biodiversity loss and tourism,” says Lemelin. India’s rich cultural heritage is also at risk due to overwhelming crowds. “Cultural tourism focuses on top landmarks and historic sites, which often have limited spaces and are quite vulnerable to damage,” says Sandeep Arora, director of Brightsun Travel, India. HOW IT STINKS: States need visitors with fat wallets. Tourism in Himachal Pradesh accounted for seven per cent of state GDP amounting to `14,000 crore, and generated 14.2 per cent direct and indirect employment, as per the latest economic survey In 2018, its capital and popular . hill station Shimla, once the summer capital of the British Empire, nearly had water riots—too many hotels built with scant regard for regulations to accommodate the tsunami of tourists which choke the Mall Road every year when residents struggle for water. This year such a situation was avoided only because the administration cut water supply to six days. There are 276 registered hotels in Shimla besides 963 home stays and Airbnbs. Over one crore holidaymakers visited HP in the first six months of 2024: Kullu and Shimla districts drew 4.73 lakh and 4.48 lakh vacationists respectively About 72.84 . lakh incomers landed up in Manali last year; 17.36 lakh crossed the Atal Tunnel. Due to the heavy influx of tourists, trails of trash scoured the sensitive mountain ecosystem. In Manali the deadly detritus of irresponsible travel, garbage, increased manifold; the waste treatment plant designed to handle 20 to 30 tonne of garbage daily was inundated with 70 to 100 tonne of trash. “The Himalayan region’s self-sustainable capacity has its limits. Where does the sewerage generated by millions of pilgrims visiting the holy shrine go? The health of the Himalayas cannot be over looked just for the sake of tourism or pilgrimage,” says Udit Ghildyal, Director, Himalayan Institute for Environment , Ecology & Development (HIEED). THE OUTSIDER INVASION: Overtourism has plunged the country’s popular travel destinations into chaos, diluting local culture. “If we continue to live here, we’re more isolated than during Covid. It’s so crowded that we try not to go out,” shares 68-year-old Mohan M, who has lived in Ooty his entire life and watched its transformation with a heavy heart. With the rise of digital nomads, viral social media trends, and growing accessibility to destinations, wanderlust is at an all-time high in India. “It is placing immense strain on both domestic and international destinations. In India, popular spots like Goa, Jaipur, Agra, and hill stations such as Manali and Shimla are struggling with overwhelming tourist volumes,” says Arora. Goa, once the coastal jewel of India which was one of the best global beachside destinations until the turn of the decade, is receiving more Indian travellers but fewer foreign visitors. Goa media is already comparing the tourist-choked state with Spain, France and Greece where locals have taken to the streets waving placards saying ‘Tourists not welcome!’ Property prices in this once-laidback haven of beaches, villages, emerald paddy fields, chalk-white churches set against a cerulean sky and elegant Portuguesebuilt villas have zoomed vertical with out-oftowners buying vacation homes here. Builders have destroyed the natural beauty of places with high-rise condominiums. “You can hardly see Goans now, it’s all people from Delhi and Mumbai. The locals really resent it,” is the popular grouse. Both prices and crime are up. It’s not just the overcrowding; littering, rising cost of living, disruption of local culture, weather changes and ecological strain have turned once-serene destinations like Ooty into overrun, fragile ecosystems and distorted its architectural heritage. The main drawback is that harassed residents cannot protest because tourist destinations have no strong local economy with revenue coming almost fully from tourism. “Because of excessive traffic and illegal parking children get to school late,” laments Sanjay Haleja, who owns the popular Gulmohar Hotel in Mussoorie. Overcrowding is having a major impact on socio-economic life of locals especially in the hills of Uttarakhand. LIVING ON THE EDGE: Ecological danger threatens South India equally More than 20,000 . vehicles enter the Nilgiris daily during peak season, according to a Tamil Nadu government report. Such mass tourism has sparked concerns over its impact on the local ecosystem, particularly elephants, and the ongoing drought. Turn to page 2