ed:saju
Coimbatore: Along with movie theatre owners, hoteliers and educationists, the travel sector is also worried about the Covid-19 surge.
Travel agents who were seeing activity in the domestic space from December, say trips are being cancelled as travellers are feeling apprehensive.
Since December, a growing number of tourists had started opting destinations in the country including Rajasthan, Shirdi, Varanasi, Goa, Kashmir and Ladakh. “We just began seeing enquiries and people had begun booking trips to Rajasthan, Leh and Goa. But they have started cancelling or postponing indefinitely,” says Nirupa Raj of city-based Ashok Travels.
“We had some bulk bookings and group trips to Shirdi, which have been cancelled after reports of increasing cases,” says P Krishnaraj of Travel Agents Association of Coimbatore.
While some people are still travelling to Maldives and then to Europe and USA for work or study, that does not give them much margins, agents said. “We don’t get much service charge by just booking international tickets, which is what work and study travellers require. Only when we book entire trips for them including stay and sightseeing, do we get margin,” says Krishnaraj. “Now, even people enquiring about Maldives are refusing to confirm as they want to see how the situation unfolds in the next few weeks.”
Travel agent Aadhav Raj says the industry continues to suffer. “Domestic travel alone cannot keep the industry going. We need Singapore flights to and from Coimbatore, so it becomes our gateway to southeast Asia and for travelling to the US.”
The agents are now banking on vaccines to give people confidence to travel. “Once vaccines penetrate enough people, all countries and states will remove restrictions on tourism,” says Nirupa Raj. “In most of the southeast Asian countries, including Singapore, sightseeing spots continue to be closed to the public.”