Excessive rains becoming perpetual curse for Himachal Pradesh tourism industry, room occupancy down to 20 pc

Excessive rains wreaking havoc in the form of cloudbursts flash floods and landslides are becoming a perpetual curse for tourism in Himachal Pradesh during the monsoon seasonHowever with the withdrawal of monsoon the hospitality industry is pinning hope on revivalThe tourism sector the main stake of Himachal contributes over Rs 14000 crore annually to the state gross domestic product SDGP and provides employment to a large populationThe room occupancy in the state which ranged between 7080 per cent in 2019 beforethe Covid pandemic stood between 1020 per cent this monsoon a sharp decline as torrential rains damaged infrastructure and washed away roads in several districts Federation of Himachal Hotels and Restaurants Association FOHHRA President Gajender Thakur told the PTI on ThursdayMonsoon withdrew from eight out of 12 districts on Wednesday Himachal received 41 per cent excess rains from June 20 till September 25 and the state suffered losses of Rs 4861 crore The state witnessed 47 cloudbursts 98 flash floods and 148 major landslides and rainrelated incidents have so far claimed 262 livesThe tourism industry is unable to bounce back after the COVID pandemic as the 2023 monsoon fury rubbed salt on the healing wounds and even in 2025 the number of tourists dropped sharply due to the Maha Kumbh then the IndoPak conflict and now the monsoon disaster he saidIn early July major tourist destinations witnessed almost zero hotel bookings with National Highways like the ChandigarhManali route severely damaged and sensational coverage of disasters and panicdriven content online further discouraged tourists even from unaffected areas exacerbating losses Thakur maintainedA permanent solution of building flyovers on flood and landslide prone areas especially in Manali is the need of the hour to ensure that the road connectivity is not affected during monsoons he said adding that we have requested the union and state governments to extend loan installments are there is no business and majority of hoteliers have taken loansThousands of pilgrims going for Manimahesh yatra were stranded in Chamba district with floods and landslides blocking the road connectivity and the news reports have created panic among the tourists who are avoiding travel to HP said a hotelierThere is no business bookings were cancelled after the monsoon disaster and trains are empty We are hoping that the tourist inflow would pick up during Navratras as now the weather is pleasant and roads are open said Lucky coordinator of Taxi Union at Shimla Railway stationThe ShimlaKalka railway track was also obstructed in the monsoon Although the services have resumed trains are running empty and there is no work says Nisar Ahmed a coolieA large number of people used to come to Shimla during Navratras from West Bengal but this year the majority of bookings were cancelled due to disaster as people saw videos and news of landslides floods and casualties which created fear says temple priest of Kali Bari temple in ShimlaStraight cutting of hills deforestation lack of proper planning construction of houses and commercial establishments on drains and river banks unscientific dumping of muck and climate change are leading to disaster during monsoon opined expertsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever