Tourism in India: Huge Opportunity

We were traveling in North India during the holidays last December. We focused mainly on Rajasthan and Varanasi, and our flight to Khajuraho was cancelled. Rajasthan is one of the most popular tourist destinations in India, perhaps second only to Agra and the Taj Mahal. It has enormous and spectacular forts like Amber in Jaipur, Mehrengarh in Jodhpur, and others in Chittaur, and Jaisalmer. In my extensive travels all over the world, I have seen very few monuments of comparable scale and architectural intricacy. The Moorish influenced Alhambra may be the closest.

Rajasthan has done a decent job with tourism so far. Guides are available in many languages (Spanish, Italian, French, German, Japanese). European tourists abound, and hence the industry caters particularly well to their needs. Beautiful old palaces and homesteads have been converted into Heritage Hotels. Food is excellent at most of these. We stayed at Fort Chanwa at Luni village outside Jodhpur, Samode Haveli in Jaipur, and Jagat Niwas Palace in Udaipur. We deliberately avoided the Taj / Oberoi experiences, and chose the more authentic “old-world” ones heavy on charm.

But logistics of getting to these places are still complex, and ridden with calamities. Our 20-minute flight from Jodhpur to Jaipur was cancelled, and instead, we were put on an 8-hour road trip, paid for and orchestrated by Indian Airlines.

During this trip, I made notes for a number of interesting business opportunities.

I know from past experience, traveling in the Himalayas is very difficult still, with long road journeys (Bus, Car) being the only resort. Accidents are common, as vehicles often get tossed down the abysmal chasms alongside the winding mountain roads.

While Sahara and Jet Airways have made travel between major cities vastly more efficient, pleasure travel infrastructure to the exotic and exquisite destinations, sadly, is still pretty pathetic. A fleet of small air-crafts placed in the right tourism routes all over India would be a great addition to India’s tourism development, and is an opportunity waiting for an entrepreneur to take charge of.