Post News Network
Bhubaneswar, Dec 8: Which tourist destination first comes to your head if you’re planning to go on a holiday to a beach where you can let your hair down and party? Most people, including those from the state, would have Goa on top of their list.
That should come as a disappointment for the state’s tourism department, as Orissa has one of the longest coastlines in the country. At 480 km, it is almost four times that of Goa’s, which has only a 125-km coast.
There are several beaches in the state such as Puri, Konark, Chandrabhaga, Gopalpur, Ramchandi and Chandipur among several others, but the state still does not see the expected number of beach tourists.
The department has taken several steps to woo foreign tourists to the state’s beaches, such as setting up OTDC resorts and organising cultural programmes like Konark Festival, besides organising road shows abroad where they showcase the state’s scenic tourist sites, but the number of foreigners visiting local beaches is still unsatisfactory.
There are several factors working against the local beaches. First and the most obvious would be the culture shock that foreigners would face on visiting beaches like Puri and Konark. Due to their proximity to religious shrines, such places are not generally considered to be ideal spots for partying, and hence tourists look for other options.
While 2005 saw a rise of 18.6 per cent in foreign tourists over the previous year, 2014 saw a rise of only 2.8 per cent over 2013, reflecting the stagnation that has crept in. Domestic tourists too are not visiting in expected numbers.
While in the first half of the decade, from 2004 to 2008, foreign tourists’ numbers grew by more than nine per cent, from 2009 it has come down to 2.87. While Orissa attracted just about 66,500 tourists in 2013, Goa saw almost four lakh foreigners.
“Goa is perceived as having a ‘free’ culture that lets people enjoy without much inhibitions. Ours on the other hand is seen as religious and orthodox. This perception has played a major part in foreigners not choosing Orissa over other states,” says RK Patnaik, assistant tourist officer of the tourism department.
Despite Puri’s beaches being home to the famous Olive Ridley tortoise, it still fails to attract foreigners because of several reasons. First is the infrastructure. Connectivity is an issue, and so is infrastructure. The food that is available at such spots also fails to cater to the palates of outsiders as it tends to be very local. Such reasons, if addressed, will see a rise in tourists, especially high-spending foreigners, opine tour operators (a foreign tourist spends around `4,100 a day, whereas a domestic one spends close to `2,700).
The extra-constitutional ban imposed by the Srimandir temple authority on the entry of non-Hindus to the 11th Century temple too does not help matters.
The comparison with Goa might however seem unfair. An exclusive beach for foreigners, beach shacks where you can drink late into the night, and vehicles available for hire at very cheap rates continue to be major brownie points which the erstwhile Portuguese colony scores over not just Orissa but most other states.
“States like Kerala and Andhra pull more tourists for beach holidaying than Orissa. Those states are reaping the benefits of what they did years ago, such as putting the required infrastructure in place. We started a little late and hopefully we will catch up with them in due course,” said Patnaik.
However, Patnaik has a word of caution. “Unless people of our state become receptive enough to accommodate people from other places and their cultures, we cannot become a front-ranking tourist destination that we aspire to be. Till then, we would remain only a spiritual destination, a pilgrimage spot for tourists than an ideal spot for going on a holiday at hte beach. We have a lot of potential to generate revenue, and we should act fast,” Patnaik says.
