Hotel association chips in to help pilgrims as government facilities go for a toss on the Chardham route, hoteldealers.in

  • Vijaylakshmi by Vijaylakshmi
  • 7 months ago
  • Business
  • 0


Hotel association chips in to help pilgrims as government facilities go for a toss on the Chardham route. (Image used for representation only)

While the Uttarakhand government has flagged off the Chardham yatra season with much fanfare last week, the poor infrastructure and the lack of preparedness in crowd management is creating havoc. Within a few days of the beginning of the pilgrimage reports about huge snarls of people and vehicles on Chardham route have started hogging headlines putting pilgrims to hardships enroute.

As district administration seems to have failed in controlling the situation as registration swelled in an unprecedented manner, the Chardham Hotel Association, the association of hoteliers and restaurateurs on the chardham route has given a call to its members to extend all kinds of support wherever required to help the pilgrims in distress with food, water and accommodation.

“It’s like sitting for an important examination without proper preparation,” blames Ajay Puri, president of the hotel association drawing parallels with the lack of preparations on the part of the government and the district administration in the conduct of a very important pilgrimage which is touted as one of the largest in terms of participation over a 6-month period.

Although there are wide all-weather roads towards the latter part of the pilgrimage from Badrinath to Kedarnath, the road conditions on the initial stretches – Gangotri and Yamunotri – is still poor resulting in huge snarls and bottlenecks due to overcrowding of vehicles and people.

“The government and the administration haven’t done proper homework, nor they involved the local stakeholders in the planning and preparations meetings. The result is for everyone to see,” says Puri.

“We have asked our members to volunteer and extend all support to pilgrims,” he says.

The registrations of pilgrims for the annual pilgrimage have seen a phenomenal increase this year. Around 25 to 30 lakh people have already been registered, says Praveen Sharma, a hotelier from Uttarakhand, and an office-bearer of Hotel & Restaurant Association of Uttarakhand.

The reason, he says, is that the element of tourism which has become predominant in the last few years.

“Hoteliers are the stakeholders and our livelihood depends on the chardham yatra. So, we feel it’s our duty and responsibility irrespective of whether the government takes us into confidence or not,” he says.

Looking at the registrations pouring in and reaching 25 lakhs already, the stakeholders expects the season to see at least 50 percent increase in visitor numbers from last year’s estimated 40 lakh visitors.

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  • Updated On May 15, 2024 at 10:00 AM IST
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  • Published On May 15, 2024 at 10:00 AM IST
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  • 2 min read
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