Election in the world's largest democracy is ringing in cash for India's tourism trade as tour operators and hoteliers are promoting the new theme-based holiday package.
"Election tourism is new a phenomenon which is fast gaining popularity. It is being marketed as an additional attraction to those who are already planning a trip or made their bookings for holidays in India," Sharat Dhall, president, Yatra.com, told IANS.
"As it is a major world event and international attention is focused on it, tourists have shown interest in extending their stay by adding major election battleground states and cities like Varanasi in their itinerary."
According to Dhall, the addition of a few extra days' stay can be managed within Rs.10,000-Rs.20,000 with high end facilities, and for as low as a couple of thousand rupees, to experience election season in places like Agra, Lucknow and Varanasi.
"Though election tourism is at a very initial stage it might generate additional revenue of two-five percentage points in revenue in this election."
Taking advantage of the election fever that has gripped the country, an Ahmedabad-based travel agency is offering ‘election tours’ — guided trips to various parts of the country, to take in the “color, noise, controversies and drama” — its website says — inherent in a vibrant democracy.
And cities in Tamil Nadu, including Udhagamandalam, Coimbatore and Chennai may make it to the list. “We began in 2012 with the Gujarat Assembly elections when we realized that many foreign tourists, especially researchers and students, were interested in getting a first-hand experience of elections in India. This time around, we got a lot of enquiries about south India, and decided to offer Tamil Nadu in our packages,” said Lav Sharma, marketing manager, Akshar Tours.
Ahmedabad-based firm Election Tourism India, which started to sell niche packages during Gujarat assembly polls in 2012, is expecting to attract around 2,000 foreigners to come for the 2014 general elections.
The package which is spread across seven days and six nights with a cost of $1,200 (Rs.75,000) without airfare, will take tourists to political rallies and show them local attractions at the same time.
"Nearly around 800 foreigners have confirmed their participation to come to India so far. They belong to Germany, France, the UK, Bahrain, Dubai, Egypt and China," Manish Sharma of Election Tourism India told IANS from Ahmedabad.
"We will be taking these tourists to political rallies, showing them how five-six lakh (500,000-600,000) people congregate in these places and how rallies are taken out in cities," Sharma said adding that his company has tied up with the BJP to showcase its rallies in Delhi, Lucknow, Varanasi and Jaipur.
London-based firm Political Tours' director Nicholas Wood told IANS about increasing numbers of inquiries related to Indian elections and people's interests in travelling to India for this purpose.
"We'd love to cover the run up to the elections. We have covered the US elections; so this could definitely be an option in future. Like all our tours we try to provide a very real approach to people's everyday problems as well as high level political analysis," said Wood, whose company promotes theme tours like 'London and the financial crisis tours', 'Libya tour - after the revolution' and 'China tours: growth and change'.
Travel portals have also registered an upswing in bookings at election "hotspots". Though the bookings have not come through a special pre-set "poll tourism" package, the trend is attributed to the general elections. "We tracked year-on-year growth of around 12% in hotel bookings for Varanasi. The numbers have grown exponentially for bigger cities - hotel bookings in Lucknow grew by 60% year-on-year while Ahmedabad has witnessed 35% growth in the same period. The general elections will fuel travel demand with increase in rail, bus and flight-bookings; and hotels and guest-houses will see an increase in demand as well," says Mohit Gupta, chief business officer for holidays at MakeMyTrip.com.
Subhash Goyal, president of the Indian Association of Tour Operators estimates an influx of about 25,000-30,000 international tourists, including journalists, in April and May. "This is usually the lean season," says Gupta, when asked about the usual influx of international tourists in these months. His own agency, Stic Travel Group, has booked tours for from Singapore and Malaysia, political science students from the US, and other groups of tourists from the UK and the Middle-East who are specifically visiting to watch the elections unfold.
Other tour operators also claim to have observed a trend which indicates higher enquiries for ticket bookings and accommodation in major cities around their respective polling dates.
"With two of the biggest political personalities contesting from Varanasi, supporters of both the parties are thronging to Varanasi to boost their candidates. We tracked year-on-year growth of around 12 percent in hotel bookings for the city," Mohit Gupta, told IANS
Gupta's views were corroborated by Pradeep Singh, a New Delhi-based guide who operates tours with international tourists from various nationalities from the national capital to Agra. "Tourists would earlier ask various questions on how to bargain in markets, or how to avoid beggars, cows and congested lanes. Now they seem to be more interested in knowing about election details, which shows that they are aware of the magnitude of things happening here," he said.
"Posters, bill boards, advertisements in newspapers seem to have grabbed tourist attention. They even want to collect election campaigning caps as souvenirs," said another who was accompanying a troupe of Korean tourists to Agra.
