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Indians arrive in numbers mostly on shopping stopovers
Sunday, 6 November 2005 - 1:43 AM SL Time
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Visiting Indians, who pop over for business and shopping bargains, is likely to replace the United Kingdom as the biggest tourism market for Sri Lanka this year, top officials said Friday.
Sri Lanka has stepped up its promotional activities in the Asian region, as traditional tourism markets like Western Europe, are still bombarded with haunting tsunami images.
But the Indian market in particular, has been singled out with special offers, thanks to relaxed visa restrictions and more flights shuttling between both countries.
`The number of Indian travellers has quadrupled since we relaxed visa restrictions on them three years back. And the way things are going, we will see the largest number of tourists coming from India this year,` said Prathap Ramanujam, Secretary Tourism Ministry.
Free Pass
Holidaymakers from some 80 countries (including India) can now pick up a one month visa when they land at the island`s sole international airport.
After years of haggling, the Indian government has also allowed more flights from Sri Lanka.
`The number of flights per week has grown from 33 to 109 over the past two years, and its still growing. We also have domestic Indian carriers flying in and that has helped swell the number of visitors,` Ramanujam said addressing delegates during the ADB sponsored Tourism Working Group Meeting under the South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation (SASEC) Programme.
While the statisticians happily clock in each Indian visitor, the hospitality industry is not quite enthusiastic.
Indians love to shop but spend less time soaking up the sun at the resorts, taking nature trails or checking into city hotels.
Most come on airline packaged deals, which offers onward holidays to other Asian destinations with a stopover in Sri Lanka.
`The airlines are virtually giving them (Indians) a free stay in Sri Lanka. It`s a stopover package to shop and they don`t use much hotel extras either,` laments Ramanujam.
The travel trade would like to push the numbers up.
`Despite large numbers the Indian government has yet to reciprocate visa formalities to us. Sri Lankans still queue outside for hours to get an Indian visa,` laments Vasantha Leelananda, President of the Association for Inbound Tour Operators.
Indian indifference, however, has not stopped scores of Sri Lankans crossing the Palk Strait to shop, explore, do business or take religious tours.
Unrealistic Targets'
Sri Lanka is hoping to attract 600,000 visitors to the island this year, with total arrivals up eight percent to 405,585 holidaymakers for the nine months to Sept.
The island`s Central Bank said earnings from tourism dropped by 11 percent to US$ 208.7 million in the first eight months of the year despite the increase in the number of foreigners visiting the island.
But foreign guest nights have fallen 36.4 percent to 240,307, according to Tourist Board Sept figures.
The difference, explains Ramanujam is that about half the number of people officially listed as `tourists` are aid workers and Sri Lankans domiciled abroad returning home, who usually don`t check into hotels.
`In actual fact, only 50 percent of them are tourists, the rest are Sri Lankans (who had obtained citizenship elsewhere) returning home, aid workers and people here for business or short conferences,` Leelananda said.
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Source(s)
• Lanka Business Online
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