TOURISM ECONOMY OF THE HIMALAYA ON A SUSTAINABLE TRAIL: A CASE STUDY OF HARIDWAR AND RISHIKESH REGION OF UTTARAKHAND

Abstract

Tourism is one of the biggest and fastest growing industries of the world. It has generated fascinating and lucrative sources of income and employment with entrepreneurship among masses, more precisely to the locals of surrounding tourist sites in Uttarakhand Himalaya. Industrialization, Globalization, and Liberalization have collectively and separately opened the new vistas for world tourism industry and also to the tourism industry of Uttarakhand. Uttarakhand a newly formed Himalayan State is now competing with other States of India in sharing the economic benefits of rapidly growing tourism industry. The State is providing modern tourism facilities in lower prices, its allocations in Indian tourism economy are escalating day and night in leaps and bounds. Positive impacts of tourism are abundant in Uttarakhand in general and Haridwar and Rishikesh in particular, as rapid development of economy, employment generation, development of the service sector, infrastructural development with various negative impacts too, like overburdened pressure on local resources, ecological and cultural deteriorations. Depletion of soil, water, air and transformations in cultural settings are more frequent in the State. The need of the time is to cope with these newly arising problems due to tourism and related activities and to fill up the widening gap between nature, culture, and tourism in the State and also in Haridwar-Rishikesh region. All such tourism activities must be in accordance with the natural phenomenon for economic and ecological sustainability in the long run. The paper endeavours the study of Haridwar- Rishikesh region in Uttarakhand, mainly concerned with tourism-based economic developments, growth and development of infrastructure and service sector, availability and status of services, perception of tourists about available services, and their satisfaction level with future strategies.