Floods Scare Tourists from Undamaged Parts of Uttarakhand

Manan Vatsyayana/Agence France-Presse â€" Getty Images Damaged buildings on the edge of the Mandakini riverbank in the town of Tilwara in Rudraprayag, Uttarakhand, on June 26.

RUDRAPRAYAG, Uttarakhand - Rescue operations in the flood-struck parts of Uttarakhand are nearly finished, and almost all of the stranded pilgrims have returned to their homes. What they leave behind are half a million people who have no way to earn a living as tourists stay away from the entire state.

The floods that began on June 16 destroyed the towns near tourist hotspots like the Hindu shrine Kedarnath in the district of Rudrapraya, and killed at least 1,000 people, with 3,000 still missing. Yet most of Uttarakhand is still open for business during what is normally the state’s high season for tourism.

On the road from Rishikesh to Rudraprayag last week, all the hotels were empty, as were the restaurants. Taxis sat idle in the parking lots, and river rafting operators were forced to pack up and leave the banks of the Ganges.

“The Uttarakhand floods have created so much of negative publicity that it has become a zero-occupancy area,” said K. P. Sharma, president of the Uttarakhand Association of Travel and Tour Operators. “Even in areas where there was no problem, like Mussoorie, all the bookings have been canceled.”

Now that over 100,000 pilgrims have been rescued and sent home, the state authorities are turning their attention to the local residents’ needs for food, shelter and employment.

“These floods will have long-term effects on local people,” said Prof! essor S.C. Bagri, a tourism expert and vice chancellor of Himgiri Zee University in Dehradun, the capital of Uttarakhand. “About half a million people depend upon tourism for their livelihood. Hotel owners will not be able to pay their loans. Local people will be forced to migrate for livelihood.”

Balbir Singh Panwar, 56, the owner of the Tulsi Hotel, a 22-room facility close to Mandakini River, was sitting in the empty dining hall of his hotel when a visitor arrived. Mr. Panwar, a former army soldier, employed 10 local boys in his hotel, which has non-air-conditioned rooms for $20 and air-conditioned rooms for $30. Though the hotel sits far enough from the river to have avoided any damage, all the rooms were empty.

“Since June 16, the occupancy is zero. Only a few journalists, government officials and relief workers came for few nights,” said Mr. Panwar. He said he took out a 20 million rupee ($330,000) loan from a bank for eight years and has paid 1.5 million of it back. “Now it willbe very difficult for me to repay the rest of the loan,” he said. “This is the peak season of tourists.”

European Pressphoto Agency A damaged car in front of a tourist complex in Sonprayag in Rudraprayag district of Uttarakhand on June 24.

Rajendra Chamola, 41, owner of the Shangrila Resorts in Rudraprayag, another 22-room hotel that remains intact, was also sitting idle in the outer courtyard of his empty hotel, which charges $25 for a non-air-conditioned room and $42 for an air-conditioned room. Out of his 15 employees, many of them have gone back to their villages, he said. “Few are left. I cannot afford to pay ! their sal! aries now,” said Mr. Chamola.

Both Mr. Chamola and Mr. Panwar complained that many hotels have been built too close to the river bank in violation of rules and norms, some of them now sitting destroyed by the recent floods. “It took me three years and a bribe of 50,000 rupees to get all the legal permissions,” said Mr. Chamola. “I was not violating any rule, but even then I was forced to pay the bribe. But I have seen hotel owners getting permits and construct their hotels in one year, and they violated all the construction rules.”

The hotel owners also described how the visitors to Kedarnath have changed over the years. Although the owners welcome all pilgrims, they said their businesses have had to adapt to more secular needs. “Earlier, the religious sentiment was very strong among the pilgrims. Now it is not so. The pilgrimage is more for fun and less for religion,” said Mr. Panwar.

Mr. Chamola said that tourists now demand air-conditioned rooms, bottles of whiskey, nonvegtarian food and a helicopter ride to the shrine, as the last 14 kilometers (9 miles) wind up a very steep trail. (The hotels located on the route of pilgrimage do not serve liquor or nonvegetarian food, however.)

Tourists and their demands of any kind would be welcome in any Uttarakhand hotel right now. S.P. Kochar, president of the Uttarakhand Hotel Association, said he was worried about the rising numbers of the jobless. “So much of unemployment may create law and order situation in the state,” he said. “Six months back, we were having a shortage of trained manpower. Nowadays, we are getting at least 50 people per day in search of a job.”

For Mr. Chamola, any efforts to help the tourism industry are futile in the short term. “The rest of the season this year is washed away,” he said. “We have been pushed back for many years.”