By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Oct 14: In what is officially being termed as “vengeance travel”, Meghalaya is witnessing a record increase in tourist footfall in 2022.
The number of tourists stood at a record 12.71 lakh in 2019 including 25,800 from foreign countries but the record has been broken this year with as many as 15 lakh tourists visiting the hill state so far, Chief Secretary DP Wahlang said on Friday.
According to Wahlang, the footfall in Meghalaya is the highest among the Northeastern states.
However, in a big downslide, only 411 international travellers have visited the state this year, he said.
Wahlang said majority of the 15 lakh tourists landed in Shillong. “The number of foreign tourists was only 411 due to the COVID-19 protocol,” he said.
Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma, meanwhile, advocated the idea of promoting and packaging the entire Northeastern region as a single tourist destination.
“People in the rest of the world and the rest of India will not specifically look into the geographical boundaries that we may have between the states since the Northeast is being looked at as one region,” Sangma told reporters.
According to the CM, tourists would like to explore various destinations like Tawang (Arunachal Pradesh), Kaziranga (Assam), Loktak Lake (Manipur) and Shillong in one go.
He suggested that it is necessary to understand what the tourists want and package in such a way that it fulfills their desire and addresses all their concerns.
“For this to take off it is very important that different states and different tourism corporations should work together and the various state governments need to have policies in place for promoting the region as one tourist destination,” he said.
The CM also highlighted the central government’s efforts to promote the NE region as a major tourist destination through the ministries of DoNER, Tourism and Culture.
Heb admitted to the concerns and said: “We need to ensure that all different systems are put in place to address those concerns, address the visa issues and the paperwork involved.
To promote connectivity, Sangma said the respective state governments should look at flight connectivity to Dhaka, Bhutan, Myanmar, Nepal and even Bangkok.
“I think it is important that we as a region should realise that six to seven capitals of different countries are within a flight range of one and a half hour from our region. So there has to be some plan to take advantage of the tourists coming in from some of these areas,” he said.
Asked if the state government is exploring the option of a new airport, he said the government was looking at all options but every move has financial implications.
“Therefore, we will see what the best way forward is. Since the investment involved will be huge it would be wrong for the government to simply jump to a conclusion and say we are going ahead with this or that programme,” he said.
Asked whether the state government was planning to adopt a model similar to Sikkim to boost the local economy when it comes to tourism, the CM said that they are in the process of formulating a policy to boost the tourism sector in the state.
According to him, Meghalaya cannot simply adopt a model from another state and replicate it here.
“It has to be an organic process and a model should be developed keeping in minds our own constraints and strengths,” he concluded.