Tourism Department says civic awareness key to attracting more travellers to Karnataka 

Karnataka Tourism Department focuses on hospitality development, addressing cleanliness issues, and promoting responsible tourism for better travel experiences.

Along with the promotion of travel destinations in Karnataka, the Tourism Department is now more focused on developing all aspects related to hospitality: ranging from behaviour of holidayers to infrastructure.

According to a department official, the domestic travel trend (those within the State) has increased significantly after the Shakti scheme (under which women can travel for free on government buses) was introduced.

“The number of women travellers, especially, has gone up. While we are concentrating on improving connectivity to destinations, the need of the hour is some awareness among travellers to get the best travel experience,” the senior official said.

The complaints of most tourists in Karnataka are about the lack of wayside amenities and their cleanliness. “Even if we take a short trip from Bengaluru to Hassan, we usually have to stop at private hotels to use the toilet instead of government restrooms, which are usually in a bad condition. I recently used the washroom on KSRTC bus stand premises in Chitradurga while travelling, and it was so unclean and unhygienic,” said Kumuda N., a traveller from Jayanagar in Bengaluru.

These complaints are not limited to one part of the State. The officials of the Tourism Department say that while they are constantly in touch with the Urban Development Department and the Public Works Department to get wayside amenities installed, they end up in bad shape within a few weeks.

“A few travellers steal things from wayside facilities, from faucets to buckets and water bottles. This results in the well-behaved travellers, who are a majority, forming a bad image of the journey to tourist destinations. Then the word-of-mouth travels. From our side, we hold many campaigns on responsible tourism, and we are also planning to hold a few more in the upcoming days,” the official said.

He added, “We have also asked UDD from time to time to hold campaigns, and while they do hold such programmes once a year, that is not enough anymore. We are now planning to ask them to hold more such campaigns and help us promote responsible tourism.”