Celebrated as the
party destination in India, Goa appears to have lost its ‘happening’ tag to the
humble Bihar. Data collected by the Union tourism ministry appears to indicate
that Bihar attracted a larger number of foreign tourists in 2009 than Goa.
The government’s India Tourism Statistics report
shows that while 4.2 lakh foreign tourists visited Bihar in 2009, Goa drew
about 3.7 lakh losing its place in the top 10 destinations in India. Industry
hands say that the economic downturn was largely responsible for the sharp
decline in the number of tourists. Increasing number of adverse reports on the
safety of women and declining law and order situation may also have been
responsible for the drop in numbers. In fact states like Kerala and Rajasthan
that have been hot international favourites have suffered the most in 2009
thanks to the global economic situation. While the number of foreign tourist
arrivals dropped by 27% in Rajasthan from 14.7 lakh in 2009 to 10.7 lakh in
2008, Kerala saw 5.4 lakh tourists arriving in 2009. Andhra, that remains
numero uno for domestic tourists, also witnessed stagnation with tourist
arrivals increasing from 7.8 lakh to just 7.9 lakh between 2008 and 2009.
Delhi lost its place as the top ranking state in
2008 to Tamil Nadu that saw a 16.7% increase in foreign tourist arrivals (FTAs)
in 2009. The top 5 states in FTAs were TN (23.6 lakh), Maharashtra (19.9 lakh),
Delhi (19.5 lakh), Uttar Pradesh (15.32 lakh) and West Bengal (11.8 lakh).
United States continued to send the maximum
number of tourists in 2009 as it had in 2008. The top 10 source countries in
2009 were USA, UK, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Canada, France, Germany, Australia,
Malaysia and Japan. These countries accounted for 64% of the total foreign
tourist arrivals in 2009.