Jammu and Kashmir Lt Gov Manoj  Sinha has announced a Rs 3 crore relief package for people employed in the tourism industry, to be disbursed over two months, wave of the Covid-19 pandemic whereby tourist bookings witnessed 95 percent of cancellation.

“A financial assistance of Rs 2,000 each will be provided to 4,444 registered shikara owners, 1,370 tourist guides, 6,663 ponywalas and 2,150 others, including palki-wallahs at the shrines of Amarnath and Vaishno Devi.” a Tourism Department official said. However, the assistance does not extend to travel agents, houseboat owners, hotels and taxi operators.

The second wave of the pandemic came as a blow to the tourism industry in the Valley, which had seen an unusually busy season since January – with international travel being out of the question, Kashmir had become the most sought-after destination not only for domestic holidayers, but also for film shoots.

Earlier this year, Tourism Minister Prahlad Singh Patel had informed Rajya Sabha that the tourist inflow in J&K went up from over 3,700 people in January 2020 to 19,000 people in January 2021, and several Hindi movies were to be shot in the Union Territory in the winter of 2021.

As per official figures, more than 1 lakh visitors arrived in the Valley between December 2020 and April 2021. In April, as many as 32,594 tourists visited the Valley - 25,956 tourists in the first half of the month, with the number dropping to only 6,638 in the second half, as Covid-19 cases started spiking across the country.

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