Telugu States should provide tourism the much-needed fillip

Working from the comforts of home which was initially considered to be the best option now seems to be losing its charm. When all offices were fully functional and the physical presence of employees was must, the techies used to work during fixed hours. But now it seems to be affecting their psychological resilience. The working hours, Monday to Friday have got extended late into evenings and sometimes to Saturdays.

On weekdays, they are not able to log out before 10 pm. They are not able to go out on holiday due to the fear of pandemic. They have lost their weekend outing, they have lost their private time after the office hours and there is hardly any relaxation of mind and body. Boredom seems to have crept into all families and all sections whether it be students or parents or teens. The excitement of meeting friends virtually over zoom or video calls has also lost its charm. It is time the Centre and the State governments realise that they should focus on the tourism sector which has the potential to get some moolah for the cash strapped governments on account of the slowdown of economy in the last six months. Not that there are no interesting places in the two Telugu States where people could go on holidays packing homemade food, enjoy the beauty of nature and return home safe by evening.

But the problem is that most of these places do not have any infrastructural facilities. Many places do not have even proper toilets and dustbins. Telangana has some beautiful places like Anantagiri, Warangal Fort, Adilabad which has highest forest cover in the State with Pranahita and Penganga flowing. We also have Rachakonda Fort near Hyderabad. This place was once the capital for Telangana region. Similarly, there are many interesting tourism spots which are not yet fully explored by the citizens near Vijayawada, Kadapa, Kurnool and other parts of Andhra Pradesh.

Nature has bestowed both the Telugu States with good natural resources. Lack of vision and interest by the successive governments resulted in non-allocation of enough funds for development of tourism sector leading to loss in terms of revenue. Not having vision is only one part. It seems the two governments are not even willing to learn from the success stories of States like Gujarat and Rajasthan for whom tourism is a major revenue earner. Gujarat, despite pandemic conditions, is spending about Rs 500 crore on promotion of tourism. It is using its white desert to earn dollars and rupees. Rajasthan too has succeeded in parking itself on the global tourism map while we are not able to offer anything even to our local tourists. Unless you invest, you cannot earn, that is the basic rule for any business. Let's hope that the two Telugu States will wake up at least now and give due importance to tourism sector and develop it in a professional manner.