Travelling is booming in Andaman, after tsunami

Port Blair, Sep 18: Tourism industry which was badly hit by 2004 tsunami is slowly limping back, claimed the Administrator of Andaman and Nicobar islands Lt. Gen., (Retd.) M.M Lakhera.

"Tourism industry of these tsunami hit islands of Andaman and Nicobar is very much on the path of revival as the number of tourists to this place has crossed over 50,000 mark upto June this year" Mr Lakhera told reporters here.

Mr Lakhera, Lt governor of Mizoram, who is also holding the additional charges of the Lt. Governor of Andaman and Nicobar islands, is presently visiting Port Blair for some days. He said that most of the tourism infrastructure, which were damaged in the December 2004 disaster have been reconstructed.

He said the population in this territory has already touched 4,000,00 with merely 38 islands inhabited out of the total 572.

"We want to develop tourism in this island territory, but the issue of carrying capacity as well as the importance of this territory from strategic point of view can not be lost sight of. Besides, tourism development in these islands can not be developed on the lines of Maldevies as we have to adopt a cautions approach in doing so," Mr Lakhera said.

He said that tourism the tourism here will be developed in phased manner. The local administration was working in a number of strategies to revive travelling in these lush green islands. Opening of new islands was one of such tourism promotional plans.

After tsunami, the local tourism industry had collapsed for a few months but with new planning and efforts the industry was doing well again. Before the disaster struck, more than 1,00,000 people visited these islands annually but in 2005 the number of tourists shrunk to 20,000 -- nearly all Indians.

This year, however, tourism has bounced back. Between January and July almost 52,000 tourist arrivals were recorded in the archipelago. In the months of June and July the arrival of foreign tourists has doubled, according to official figures.

UNI