The tourism industry in India is badly hit due to the nationwide lockdown. A report by KMPG, financial services and business advisory firm suggested that the Indian tourism and hospitality industry is staring at a potential job loss of around 38 million, which is 70% of the total workforce due to COVID-19.
According to World Travel and Tourism Council, a global forum to raise awareness about the industry as many as nine million jobs which is six times the population of Goa in the travel and tourism sector are at risk in India. This be a setback for national employment if the trend continues.
The sector accounts for 12.75% of employment – 5.56% of it direct and 7.19% indirect. Over 87 million people were employed in the tourism industry in 2018-’19.
This is as per the ministry of tourism’s annual report for 2019-20.
There is a uniformly dismal story of cancelled bookings from February 2020 leading to ‘complete paralysis’ by mid-to-late March 2020.
Ajay Bali, managing director of the Mumbai-based BCD Travel India, the Indian arm of the Dutch corporate travel management firm said that the industry has come to a standstill as the crisis has hit its nerve centres – the airlines and railways. And in the next 45 days, they do not even know if there will be recovery.
This is one of the worst crises to hit the tourism industry and it has impacted all its segments –inbound, outbound and domestic, and leisure, cruise, adventure, corporate meetings, conference, and exhibitions mention Unmesh Vaidya, currently business head at Iqomi Travel Services, a Mumbai-based startup specialising in corporate services such as meetings, incentive trips and conferences.
Bali described a job situation in flux, with some employees working from home – to handle cancelations, for instance, others asked to take their allotted leave, and those with no leave asked to go on leave without pay. Senior staff, he said, had been asked to take 30%-40% pay
