It’s now more than a month since I came back from my trip to Northern India and I am still struggling to put into perspective some of the sights that I saw – the children with deformed limbs begging at Agra Station; subsistence farmers at the mercy of the Wild Boar and Languars who raid their fields with impunity, and the women doing backbreaking work digging drains alongside the highways that must be ready for the Commonwealth Games in Delhi this coming autumn. As noted in the previous post, the high point of the trip was a week’s trekking in the Binsar Sanctuary in Kumuaon, within sight of the Himalayas. What makes the holiday, which is run by http://www.villageways.com/, special is the fact that it was set up precisely to bring income to the poorest residents of the area, those who have few opportunities to earn cash that can buy additional food and other supplies – in other words, to begin to pull them out of poverty.
It became obvious, talking to our guides, that levels of tourist activity remain low in the area even after three years of operation. Whilst it is a frustration to the guides that they aren’t able to earn more money by working with more than one or two groups a month, nonetheless they are still appreciative not only of the additional income but also the opportunity to interact with their clients, share their heritage and culture and exchange songs, stories and folk tales.
Solving all of India’s social and economic problems is obviously way beyond the scope of the tourism sector, but it was pleasing to see tourism making a difference in one small corner of the country. If all tour operators thought a little more about how they can direct at least some of the action towards those who most need the opportunity, just think what a change we could make.
