Rural Tourism: A Prominent Niche for Indian Tourism

Author:Neha Sharmaa, Amar Kumar Tiwarib

Abstract:
Rural India has much to offer to the world rich in tradition of arts, crafts, and culture. Rural India can emerge as important rural tourist destination. Those who have a craze for knowledge about traditional ways of living ,arts and crafts can possibly be attracted to visit the country life of India, if the concept of rural tourism is promoted strategically .Tourism growth potential can be harnessed as a strategy for Rural Development. The development of a strong platform around the concept of rural tourism is defiantly useful for a country like India, where 74% of the population resides in its 7 million villages. Across the world the trends of industrialization and development have had an urban centric approach. Alongside the stress of urban lifestyle have led to a “counter-urbanization” syndrome. Rural tourism is one of the few activities which can provide a solution to problem like falling income level and lesser job opportunities. Besides, there are other factor which is shifting the trend towards rural tourism like increasing level of awareness, growing interest in heritage and culture and improved accessibility and environmental consciousness. The government, of late, has realized what the rural India can offer to the world. The tenth five year plan has identified tourism as one of the major sources for generating employment and promoting sustainable livelihoods. The union ministry of tourism in collaboration with UNDP has launched the endogenous tourism projects linked to the existing rural tourism scheme of the government. The UNDP has committed $ 2.5 million for the projects. UNDP will help in areas of capacity building, involvement of NGOs, local communities and artisans forge strong community-private and public sector partnership. The government also decided to develop necessary infrastructure for facilitating rural tourism. The researchers, realizing the above facts and abundant opportunities in this field, is submitting this research paper which would certainly be an asset for the planners and practitioners.

Keywords:Key words: Rural Tourism Planning.

DOI:

International Journal of Trade & Commerce (Vol: 3 Issue:1)