Visa woes for Indians travelling to Europe, the USA and other developed countries is music to the ears of the Indian hospitality industry, which clocked one of the best seasons in the first six months of this calendar year.
Indians’ fascination for everything global has met with the harsh reality of visa rejection, delayed visas and also the uncertainty surrounding granting of visas by foreign embassies that have led to a rethink amongst the well-heeled Indians on the need to shift their weddings to Indian locations and similarly forced Indian corporates who bank on exotic incentive vacations overseas for their top dealers to shift focus back to India.
Sensing this huge opportunity, the Indian hotel industry is gearing up for a robust winter season. Listed hotel chains such as the Indian Hotels Company Ltd (IHCL), which runs the prestigious Taj group of hotels, ITC Hotels or brands like Lemon Tree amongst others have outlined their expansion plans to take advantage of this opportunity. Most of the branded listed players have had a stellar run as far as occupancies and Average Room Rates (ARR), are concerned.
Taj has a portfolio of 242 hotels across brands and they plan to scale it up to over 300 operational hotels by 2025. Similarly, other hotel chains such as ITC Hotels and Lemon Tree plan to add more hotels and all under the asset-light strategy, wherein they will only manage the hotels.
This change in dynamics in the Indian hotel industry will be welcomed by other segments of the travel industry, namely the transport and allied sectors. The launch of Akasa Air last month and the impending relaunch of Jet Airways is a welcome development as this will add more capacity to the domestic market. Though the Indian aviation landscape is quite competitive, it’s still underserved as the potential for air travel far exceeds the capacity deployed by the airlines.
Under the new management, Air India has lined up expansion plans in the domestic sector. Similarly, Air Vistara has ambitious plans. Not to forget the market leader Indigo is not letting the competition get to them by adding more frequencies. All this will give a boost to the Indian aviation landscape and tourists and corporates will be in a better position to take advantage of this opportunity. This in turn will help the industry grow.
According to the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), one in 10 jobs in India is created by the tourism industry. This is necessary from the country’s standpoint as underemployment is fairly rampant in India and tourism is the mainstay with little upskilling will address unemployment concerns.
Overall, this winter is expected to be good for Indian tourism as the slow pace of visa approval for overseas destinations is a blessing in disguise for the resurgent tourism sector.
