"The SC verdict has already had an impact. We were organizing a two-week north India tour for a group of international travellers priced at $5,000 per head, which has just been cancelled," said Rajat Singla, chief director of Pink Vibgyor, a dedicated LGBT tour operator in New Delhi.
Pink Vibgyor was one of the first travel services firms that came up after the 2009 Delhi high court's favourable verdict on the issue. When Singla started, he handled around 40 bookings, which over the years jumped to 1,000, of which nearly 75% were Australians.1
Besides tour operators, hotels too opened their doors to homosexual tourists, known to be big spenders, by tying up with World Rainbow Hotels (WRH), a group that focuses on the LGBT travellers' market.
About 30 Indian business and leisure properties, including Taj Mahal, New Delhi, Taj Lake Palace, Udaipur, Ananda in the Himalayas and The Park, Chennai, have tied up with the WRH. To be approved by WRH, hotels have to meet strict selection criteria which analyses the hotel's location, characteristics and category, knowledge of the local gay scene, current involvement with the LGBT community, and the hotel's compliance with non-discrimination policies and same-sex benefits for their staff.
These alliances are now, however, under a cloud as WRH prefers associations only in those countries where homosexuality is legal. About 83% of homosexual travellers seek a hotel that welcomes same-sex couples, data from WRH showed.
"As long as the person obeys the rule of the land, hotels do not have any objection as we do not ask for marriage certificates," said Param Kannampilly, founder of Concept Hospitality, adding that hotels do have twin-room sharing and these are offered without questions as people come for a variety of reasons like conferences and training sessions.
"The LGBT community does offer a huge potential for the hospitality sector, but if they put their relationships on display, hotels would be forced not to encourage them as the law now says so," Kannampilly said.
Travel pundits said that the SC verdict will benefit neighbouring gay friendly countries such as Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand. They added that government support would have aided in making India a hot spot on gay tourism gap as the country is ranked one of the sought-after destinations by this community.
The first time the Indian hospitality industry spoke about this market's potential openly was at its annual conference in April. At the conference, Shriji Arvind Singh Mewar, owner of Historic Resorts Hotels group, encouraged hoteliers to look at the LGBT market and said, "To tap this group we need to understand the nuances and treat them like any other special interest groups like pilgrims and adventure junkies." Industry observers cited the example of the US, which is one of the biggest LGBT markets, topping $100 million, with gay American men having the highest discretionary spending per capita of about $7,000.
However, some metro hotels don't see the SC verdict impacting the business much. "The Indian hospitality sector has always been intrinsically involved with the LGBT community as hotels always play host to fashion events, where most of the participants, including designers, are members of the gay community. And I don't see that changing at all," said a general manager of a five-star star property in Bangalore.1
source;http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/SC-order-will-hurt-Pink-tourism-growth/articleshow/27262729.cms
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