Foreign tourists give Goa a no-go

Tourists traffic to state hit by bomb blast on Friday and 10 murders last week expected to drop by 15 %

Tourists traffic to state hit by bomb blast on Friday and 10 murders last week expected to drop by 15 percent

Goa's tourism business has suffered due to the economic slowdown in the last two years, and tour operators say incidents like the Madgaon blasts on Friday that left two dead (see box) will only make matters worse. To compound the problem further, the Israeli government last week, issued a travel advisory that asks its citizens to keep away from Goa.

Falling numbers

Big drop: The number of foreign tourists visiting Goa dropped by 13 per cent from 2008 to 2009. file picu00a0

While in 2007, 82,515 foreign visitors came to Goa by chartered and scheduled flights between September and December, in 2008, the number dropped to 71,918 in the corresponding period - a 13 per cent drop. While figures for 2009 will only be available by the end of this year, insidersu00a0 say the numbers may shrink by another 15 per cent.

Nilesh Shah, of Panaji-based Raj Travels says business would take a bad hit if the young and wealthy Israelis keep away. "We do expect the number of domestic tourists to increase, but the overall business will nevertheless drop by at least by 15 per cent.

Even the discounts being offered on hotel rooms till November 30 will do little good. The economic slowdown had affected business adversely and the murders and the recent blasts have hurt us even further," said Shah.

Trips cancelled
Devang Sanghvi of Andheri-based Venus Holidays said that quite a few Goa-bound travelers cancelled their Diwali weekend trip, while refusing to give numbers. "Many have chosen Dandeli and Kankavli over Goa because the beaches are as good and the places offer as many options for water sports as Goa.

This is happening because following incidents like the Scarlett Keeling (15) murder and the recent blasts, tourists prefer locations that are considered safer. In the months ahead, I expect the numbers of tourists who visit Goa in the coming months," Sanghvi said.

Namita Sharma (20), a TYBcom student, was asked by her parents to drop her plans to visit Goa for the holidays. She is going to Pune instead.

"The murders of young girls, including Scarlett Keeling had my mother really worried. Which is why we settled for a trip to Pune instead. It is closer to home and the swine flu panic has also died down," explained Sharma.

10 Number of murders in Goa in the last one week
4 Number of people arrested for the murder of a ragpicker, his wife and two children
2 Number of men from Mumbai arrested for killing 4 women for money, including 16-year-old Evita Rodrigues in Goa
18 Number of persons gone missing in the last 2 weeks in Goa
15 The age of British teenager Scarlett Keeling who was found raped and murdered on Anjuna Beach in February 2008

OPTIMISTIC NOTE
President of the Travel and Tourism Association of Goa Ralph de Souza, however, remains optimistic that business will improve. "We had 617 chartered flights last year compared to the 750 that we usually get during peak season from October to March. This year we have 640 flights planned, and there were 23 chartered flights in October alone," said De Souza. "We are getting fewer travelers from the United Kingdom with only 203 flights this year as compared to 254 in 2008, but we have more Russian (271 flights), Armenian (28 flights), Hungarian (18 flights) and Kazakh (25 flights) arrivals that we hope will make up for the shortfall."

We're innocent: Sanatan Sanstha
Members of Sanatan Sanstha yesterday denied they had anything to do the blasts in Madgaon, which Abhay Vartak, the Sanstha spokesperson condemned at a press conference in Mumbai yesterday.
"Someone might have placed the explosives on the bike," said Vartak. "It is not true that we are linked to Sadhvi Pragya Thakur or Yogesh Naik, an accused in the blasts. It is unfair to blame the entire group for alleged activities of a few stray elements," Vartak added.