War fears have taken their toll on the tourism industry, with inbound travel down by around 30 per cent in India. Tickets and hotel bookings are being cancelled from both the US and Europe.
Travel Agents Association of India vice-president Balbir Mayal said while business from Europe was down 35 per cent, business from the US was down by at least 60 per cent.
Lalit Suri, chairman and managing director, Bharat Hotels, said inbound business travel was down by at least 25 per cent.
"Not only are people canceling their bookings, they are not even booking for April and May," he said.
Federation of Hotels and Restaurants Association of India Secretary-General Shyam Suri said hotel bookings for the summer season were considerably down.
"A lot of business travel comes during the summer, which is not happening because of security threats," he said.
Former Sita Travel head and Select Resorts Managing Director Arjun Sharma said inbound traffic was down by around 20 per cent. "The second half of March has seen a substantial drop in bookings," he added.
Sushil Gupta, managing director, Asian Hotels, said while there were no cancellations as yet, bookings had fallen substantially because people were concerned about the imminent war.
Stic Travel Group Chairman Subhash Goyal said though there were no bookings from the US and the UK, some bookings were still coming in from Latin America.
Another travel agent added that various conferences planned for the coming months might be cancelled if the situation worsened.
ITC Hotels Managing Director SSH Rehman said while Americans would travel within the country or Japan, Europeans would prefer intra-country travel within the continent.
There will be some traveling within South-East Asia, Australia and Japan barring sensitive areas.
Leading European airlines and Air-India, however, said though there were no perceptible changes as yet, they were anticipating heavy cancellations if war broke out. Outbound travel to the west have already been hit by around 40 per cent because of war fears.
Travel agents were feeling the pinch because the summer season was the prime booking period for outbound leisure travel and margins on leisure travel were at least five times the margins on business travel, Sharma said. While business travel had not been affected as yet, leisure travel to the west had been hit, he added.
