With China’s help, Maldives plans to lower dependence on India in tourism, trade and healthcare: Data

Controversial tweets strain India-Maldives relations, leading to a tourism boycott and strengthening of ties between Maldives and China.

In January, controversial tweets by deputy ministers of the Maldives on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Lakshadweep led to a diplomatic row between the two countries. The consequences of this row have been two-fold. The tweets sparked a call by some Indians on social media to boycott the Maldives. This was an attempt by them to puncture the biggest money-maker for the Maldives, the tourism industry. Meanwhile, Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu strengthened ties with one of India’s rivals, China. Just a few days after tensions between the Maldives and India flared up, Mr. Muizzu visited China, met with Chinese President Xi Jinping, and appealed to Chinese tourists to visit his nation in large numbers and reclaim the top spot in tourist arrivals, which they once held.

Chart 1 | The chart shows the number of tourists who visited the Maldives in the first 35 days of 2023 and 2024.

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While the number of Indian tourists visiting the Maldives has declined marginally, Chinese tourists have swifty filled this gap, resulting in an overall increase in tourist inflows, data show. The number of Indians who visited the archipelago dropped marginally from 21,460 to 16,895 in the period considered. It is important to note that the decline cannot be entirely attributed to the boycott call as a considerable share may also have dropped their plans fearing repercussions of the ongoing row, among other reasons. Moreover, the number of Russian tourists also decreased from 26,305 to 22,577 in the period, so India is not an outlier.

Also read: Indian tourists’ boycott call post Modi visit to Lakshadweep may impact Maldives | Data

The decline in Indian visitors did not have an impact on the overall number of tourists to the Maldives. In fact, if the first 35 days of 2023 and 2024 are compared, the number of tourists went up slightly from 1,97,252 to 2,22,502. This increase is entirely due to the sudden surge in the number of Chinese tourists from just 6,563 to 25,303 in the period.

Chart 2 | The chart shows the number of medical tourists from the Maldives who visited India for treatments.