Prime Minister Narendra Modi stressed the need for year-round tourism in Uttarakhand on Thursday as this can foreclose the seasonal economic imbalance in the hill state. In Uttarkashi, he told an event that tourism booms from March to June, but during winters, the number of visitors comes down drastically, and hotels, resorts, homestays, and other accommodations stand empty. He said that economic growth suffers from this seasonal downturn and involves environmental challenges.
The need to have a 360-degree approach to tourism was stressed by Modi to bring employment to the local youth across the year and make Uttarakhand realize its full economic potential. For the state’s bright winter sunshine, he came up with the idea of ‘Gham Tapo Tourism’ (Basking in the Sun Tourism), which offers to attract tourists especially from the fog-prone states.
He also asked the corporate sector to supplement winter tourism by hosting the meetings, the conferences and the exhibitions in Uttarakhand so that we get continuous flow in the visitors during off season. He also mentioned major infrastructure projects that are changing the face of the region, the Char Dham all-weather road, modern expressways, better railway connectivity, better air and helicopter services.
Modi refers to the newly approved Kedarnath and Hemkund ropeway projects, which he said opened up tourism to the difficult terrain, as key in helping boost accessibility, which is crucial to tourism. Sitting close to 1 km apart, the Rs 6,811 crore ropeway proposed between Sonprayag and Kedarnath (12.9 km) meeting the Govindghat (12.4 km) to Hemkund Sahib ghat would together be constructed within four to six years. It includes the Kedarnath ropeway, which will reduce travel time from 8-9 hours to 30 minutes, allowing elderly and differently abled visitors to visit the temple with less effort.
He noted about the large number of the Char Dham Yatra pilgrims, which went up from 1.8 million annually before 2014 to close to 5 million today, indicating Uttarakhand’s increasing appeal as a spiritual and tourism hub.
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