Anti-CAA protest: Assam tourism, NFR suffer

GUWAHATI: Following the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protest in Assam, state tourism claims that it has suffered losses to the tune of Rs 1000 Crore in the last two months.
November to March is peak tourism season for Northeast India. Chairman of the Assam Tourism Development Corporation (ATDC) Jayanta Malla Baruah said following the anti-CAA violent protest, there have been series of cancellation from domestic and foreign tourists.

He said there is travel advisory from several countries. “At least ten countries including USA, UAE, Canada, UK, Australia, France, Isreal, Taiwan, Russia and Singapore have issued travel advisory to the citizens following the violence in Assam.”

Baruah said that in the last three years, the tourism department has put lot of hard work to create a vibrant image of Assam tourism. However, it stands damaged. The tourism sector is hit the worst due to the violence. "Once the image is damaged, it takes a lot of time to rebuild the same image,” he said.

Assam tourism was eyeing close to 65 lakh domestic tourists this year. It also expected 45,000-50,000 foreign tourists.

“In Guwahati alone, Rs 13.25 core was lost between December 11 to December 25 for cancellation of hotel booking. In Unesco’s world heritage site, Kaziranga National park jeep safaris took a huge betting. There are 437 Jeep in Kaziranga national park that offers Safari service to tourists. These Jeep’s generally do at least two trips per day. As there are hardly footfalls, most of them were sitting idle,” the chairman of ATDC added.

In Assam, as per the ATDC, around 50,000 people are engaged directly or indirectly in the tourism sector, and the present situation has affected these families.

To rebuilt the image, ATDC announced the launch of a digital campaign of “Awesome Assam” in collaboration with Google.

“As part of the campaign, google display network will be leveraged to capture potential tourist’s attention and put our ads in front of people to drive interest and also remind people who have previously visited our site. Youtube will be leveraged to reach the most relevant audience as online video audiences are receptive and captive. More than 264 million people engage with youtube every month,” he said.

Next month, the ATDC will hold road shows in Mumbai, Bangaluru, Goa and in Hyderabad to promote Assam as the best and safest tourist destination.

Due to violent agitation by protestors against the CAA in various areas within the jurisdiction of Northeast Frontier Railway(NFR), which started on December, 2019, the cumulative loss incurred by NFR crossed Rs 100 Crore till 30th December 2019.

Subhanan Chanda, Chief Public Relations Officer said NFR not only incurred losses due to damages caused to railway properties but also due to the cancellations of passenger trains as well as goods carrying trains to and from NFR zone. The damages include burning down of railway stations, damages to railway track, level crossing gates, burning of important communication and other electronic gears.

Total damages caused to railway properties in divisions like Tinsukia, Katihar, Lumding, Rangiya is about Rs 10 Crore. The loss incurred in originating earnings due to loss in passenger earnings is about Rs 30.13 crore; the loss in freight earnings is about Rs 63.42 crore, while the loss in parcel earnings is about Rs 5.05 crore from 9th of December till 30th December, 2019.

During this period, about 38.86 lakh passenger could not take up their journey in NFR due to cancellations of trains.