Beyond GDP and Jobs & the Soft Power of Tourism and Brand India

I want to speak about one factor that India has come to recognise over the past three or four years. Those who have not recognised it are, I believe, in denial: the extraordinary resilience of the tourism and hospitality sector.

COVID tried to destroy this sector. It was written off. Revenues fell to zero, and few imagined that it could bounce back in the way it did. Some of us believed it would, and I am glad it has, because what followed has been nothing short of remarkable.

Consider just the past 15 or 16 months. In April last year, we had Pahalgam. In May came Operation Sindoor, followed in June by the airline accident. July, August and September brought relentless rain, landslides and flooding. Then came airline chaos in December. Finally, there was the West Asia crisis: we thought it had stopped, then it started again; we thought it had stopped once more, and it started yet again.

Everything that could have gone wrong seemed to go wrong. Yet the sector demonstrated its resilience.

The industry has also made a growing contribution to investment and economic activity. The last available figures placed hospitality at number one in private capital expenditure. When the Chief Economic Adviser releases the next report, I do not expect that picture to change significantly. If hospitality is not number one, it will certainly be among the top three.

Tourism is also making a double-digit contribution to the economies of several states. We expect that from Goa and Kashmir, but who would once have imagined Uttar Pradesh joining that group?

Much of our traffic has been domestic. Our single largest upside, however, is securing India’s fair share of foreign tourist arrivals. I say this repeatedly when speaking to analysts and others: this is our hidden upside. Imagine what would happen if, alongside strong domestic business, foreign tourist arrivals grew from 10 million to 20 million, 25 million or even 30 million.

The story has only just begun. We are not at half-time, and certainly not in the second half. The next 21 years will take us to Viksit Bharat 2047. A 10 per cent contribution from tourism to GDP and 100 million jobs may well prove to be conservative estimates. I believe the sector can go beyond those numbers.

Seven or ten years ago, not many would have imagined India ranking among the world’s five largest economies and becoming the world’s fastest-growing major economy. Developments occur in a sequence. A country cannot become one of the world’s leading economies without a population that spends, or without business and leisure travellers from around the world becoming increasingly curious about it.

As India’s global standing, per capita income and GDP grow, tourism will grow with them – and rightly so. Beyond GDP and jobs, we must not underestimate the soft power of our country and its brand. Ultimately, the strength of that brand can help India progress faster than almost anything else.