The Tourism Department has put the brakes on its drive to revive the sector in view of the surge in COVID-19 cases in the State. Many of the campaigns especially designed to encourage limited travel, including ‘Love Your Local’ to urge people to visit places of tourist interest within their city or district, too have been put on the back burner for now.
A senior official in the department admitted that they were going slow on tourism promotion as holiday and leisure activity was not considered a priority in view of the changing situation and surge in cases. “The thrust is on safety and and tourism could be blamed in case of a community spread and hence the cautious approach,” the official added. There have been instances of locals resenting influx of tourists into their regions given the fear of the pandemic.
When contacted, Kumar Pushkar, MD, KSTDC, said the promotional activity has been a low key affair in view of the evolving situation. Besides, a few properties of the KSTDC across the State will be used for institutional quarantine, he added. He said the decision of the authorities in different districts dealing with the pandemic has to be respected and there cannot be mass promotion or mass tourism under the current circumstances. He added the unlocking since June 8, 2020, was to kickstart economic activity essential for sustenance leading to gradual recovery and once the situation attained near normalcy and stabilised the promotional drive too would pick up.
That people too are not keen on undertaking a holiday or visiting places of tourist interest is evident from the number of visitors to the Mysuru palace where the number of people visiting after the unlocking, hovers around 90 to 110, as per the records maintained by the palace board. This is against its normal footfall of nearly 3 lakh tourists in pre-COVID-19 times.
Promoting MICE tourism is also part of the revival scheme, but it will take a back seat for the present.
