Higher spending but fewer visitors: India must fix its tourism strategy

Tourists in India from abroad are growing in number, but recovery from the fall after the pandemic is still not complete. The recent data from the Ministry of Tourism showed that arrivals reached 9.95 million last year, still below the 2019 peak of 10.93 million. The 2025 season has opened on a softer note: 5.6 million as of August — below the 6.3 million recorded in the same period last year.  Several challenges could be affecting the recovery, like poor air quality in big cities such as Delhi, and periodic travel advisories from key markets. Further, the distribution of arrivals last year shows that the largest share (35.62 per cent) went to the North zone, followed by the South (26.27 per cent), West and Central (19.94 per cent), East (16.60 per cent), and only 1.58 per cent to the Northeast, signalling that tourism remains heavily concentrated around gateway metros and classic circuits.

 

Although the tourism Budget for 2025-26 remained broadly unchanged at ₹2,541 crore, allocation for overseas promotion and publicity, including crucial Market Development Assistance (MDA), has been slashed sharply to just ₹3.07 crore from ₹33 crore last year. Besides, long-standing bottlenecks persist: Slow evisa processing, limited visa-on-arrival access, and insufficient direct international flights from major source markets. The Indian Association of Tour Operators has highlighted a rising interest from North America, Europe, and West Asia, and a notable surge in MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions) and enquiries on wellness tourism. However, infrastructure gaps constrain India’s ability to capture this demand. According to estimates of the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), spending in India by international tourists touched a record ₹3.1 trillion last year, indicating that while fewer tourists are coming to this country, those who come are spending more. The council also projects that travel and tourism could contribute nearly ₹42 trillion to India’s gross domestic product and support around 64 million people by 2035, underscoring the sector’s long-term potential. India must address gaps such as inadequate last-mile connectivity, limited transport linkages, poor sanitation, weak multilingual infrastructure, and insufficient quality lodging.

 

India ranks 39th on the World Economic Forum’s 2024 Travel and Tourism Development Index, performing strongly on natural and cultural resources. But to translate this into sustained, broadbased growth, the government and industry must act decisively. The government must adequately fund international marketing, ideally by reviving a stronger, modern version of “Incredible India” with digital campaigns and coordinated participation in global travel fairs. Visa reforms are urgent: The evisa process needs to be faster, simpler, and available to more countries. Air connectivity must also improve, with more direct flights to Tier-II hubs like Kochi, Goa, Jaipur, and Guwahati so that growth spreads beyond the big metros. Tour operators also stress promoting longer travel routes combining culture, nature, wellness and spiritual circuits’ trips, which increase per-tourist spending and distribute visitors across regions. A coordinated and well-funded strategy can help India capitalise on its tourism potential, becoming a source for employment generation and foreign-exchange earnings.