India reaps rich rewards
- By Shailaja Neelakantan - New Delhi

On a recent Sunday afternoon in south Mumbai, hotel touts were having a field day. "All booked," they gleefully announced to scores of tourists, many of who were medium-to- high- budget travelers, as they hoped to lure them into one of the area's numerous low- budget holes in the wall. Shockingly, the low-rent motels were booked as well. This is the story all over India this tourist season.In the past 18 months, India has focused on promoting tourism,It launched an effective international advertising campaign,India was spared the SARS outbreak,which hurt many Southeast Asian destinations,Tourist arrivals are up in record numbers

It's quite a change from the past 20 years or so. India seems to have been a preferred destination for Western tourists only once before--in the 1960s' flower-power era. Of course, over the years many visitors came to see the Taj Mahal, but confronted by the hordes of touts and spurious guides, they rarely ventured beyond the golden triangle of Delhi-Agra-Jaipur.
It didn't help that the Indian government never promoted tourism in an organized fashion or made known the wealth of historic sites that India has to offer. In comparison, countries like Thailand, Malaysia, China and Singapore have been miles ahead of India. In the year to May 2001 India had about 2.5 million tourist arrivals while China, Malaysia and Thailand had in excess of 10 million tourist arrivals each.

The Indian government's attitude towards tourism suddenly changed for the better a year and a half ago and it has already made a difference. While tourist arrivals haven't crossed even the 5 million mark, the increase has nevertheless been dramatic compared to Southeast Asia. In 2003, India's tourist inflow rose 15.3% and foreign-exchange earnings through tourist arrivals rose as much as 20% over 2002's figure. In fact, tourism in 2003 exceeded pre-September 11, 2001 levels.

According to data compiled by the Pacific Asia Travel Association, a trade grouping, in January-September 2003 tourism declined over the previous year by 28.5% in Malaysia, by 12.7% in Thailand and 23.5% in China; Singapore saw a decline of 23.4 % in January-October 2003. "India's growth has been beyond expectations. Only once did we see growth of this kind and that was some years after the liberalization of the Indian economy had begun, but even then it was a corporate-driven boom. This is pure tourism," says Vijay Srinivasan, deputy general manager at Le Passage in New Delhi, which arranges high-end package tours mostly for French tour groups.

Most of the five-star hotels are seeing more than 80% occupancy and some of the lesser-known five-star hotels are overbooked. "Clients who made bookings several months ago are being bounced and I am getting requests for bookings that I am not able to cater to. I have also had to move many from five-star hotels to three-star hotels," Srinivasan says.