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Bloomberg Analysis: Why is India attracting fewer foreign tourists than Albania?

2026-09-05 17:25:07Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX
Bloomberg Analysis: Why is India attracting fewer foreign tourists than Albania?
Why India is attracting fewer foreign tourists than Albania

Bloomberg / India has some of the world's most iconic monuments and dozens of UNESCO World Heritage sites — but it attracts fewer foreign tourists than Albania.

Looking for an off-the-beaten-path trip to celebrate her graduation from Virginia Tech, Casey Volanth traveled to India with her mother in the summer of 2015.

Immediately after arriving in New Delhi, they entered a government travel agency to buy train tickets for a several-week trip around the country.

Or at least that’s what they thought it was. Once inside, conversations about train schedules and fares quickly turned to demands for identification — and money. “We quickly realized it had nothing to do with the government,” Volanth says. As the anxiety grew, her mother sent a nervous message to a friend with more experience in U.S. travel: “They told us, ‘You have to get up and leave immediately.’”

Mother and daughter quickly left, wallets still in hand. In the end, they bought their own train tickets and over the following weeks visited the Taj Mahal, the desert cities of Rajasthan, the holy city of Varanasi, and the ashrams of Rishikesh.

Volanth, who is now 34 and lives in Annapolis, Maryland, has returned to India four more times, traveling through the mountainous, temple-filled northern regions.

Volanth is a rare occurrence in India, having come so often. The most populous country in the world — with 45 UNESCO World Heritage sites, more than 100 national parks, the world's highest mountain range, and the palaces and ruins of countless empires — should be teeming with visitors.

However, India's Ministry of Tourism recorded only 9.15 million foreign tourists last year, with about half coming from North America and Europe.

This is less than the number recorded by Albania, a country with less than 3 million inhabitants, compared to India's approximately 1.4 billion inhabitants.

In a report published in June, the Indian government's research institute, NITI Aayog, noted that India's foreign tourism revenue, at $35 billion, lagged behind smaller competitors such as Turkey, Thailand and Saudi Arabia, "despite India's wider range of cultural, natural and tourist experiences."

Tourist numbers in India are not just low, they are falling. Arrivals last year were 8.1% lower than the year before and 16% below the pre-pandemic peak of 10.9 million visitors in 2019.

Some tour operators say the real figure, excluding cases such as medical tourism and family visits, is much lower. Ravi Gosain, president of the Indian Tour Operators Association, estimates the real number of foreign tourists is around 2 or 3 million.

The tourism industry and tourists themselves offer a variety of reasons why India has struggled to attract foreign visitors. Stories of scams similar to what Volanth experienced abound, while the U.S. State Department and other foreign governments warn of security concerns, especially for women and solo travelers. Transportation can be difficult for foreigners to use. Even obtaining visas can be a complicated process.

Perhaps the biggest reason, however, is that Indians themselves are traveling more domestically, driving up costs for international visitors and pushing the industry to adapt to local preferences.

While foreign tourism remains weak, domestic travel rose 46% last year to 4.29 billion, almost double the pre-pandemic peak. Driven by rising living standards, a vast expansion of infrastructure and a growing interest in religious pilgrimages, India's tourism industry now caters largely to Indians themselves.

Meanwhile, the falling rupee has made travel abroad more expensive, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi has urged citizens to spend their travel budgets domestically.

A side effect of the domestic tourism boom is greater competition for items like domestic flights and hotels, which has led to higher prices. This can make India a less attractive destination for foreigners compared to more affordable destinations in Southeast Asia, says Ashish Verma, who heads operations in North, South and Central Asia for tour operator Intrepid Travel.

“It’s a very good thing that the country is experiencing a huge increase in domestic tourism, but when demand is so high, hotels in Goa are always full,” he adds, referring to a popular coastal destination that was once a winter destination for Europeans. According to government data, domestic tourists in Goa now outnumber foreigners by 20 times.

“Anyone looking for good beaches can find better prices in Sri Lanka or Vietnam.”

One simple step the government can take to boost foreign tourism is simply to spend more on promoting India as a destination, industry groups say.

In its most recent budget, India allocated just 35 million rupees ($367,000) to promote tourism abroad. “It’s less than what I spend on my own marketing,” quips Dipak Deva, managing director of Travel Corp. India Ltd., a tour operator for foreign visitors.

He believes the country should be more visible online, especially on social media.

“The reason we’re not growing is not because we don’t have a product, not because we don’t have the best hotels, not because we don’t have service, content or quality,” he says. “It’s because the government isn’t promoting India.”

Gosain says his organization has repeatedly urged the government to take foreign tourism more seriously. He argues that more international travelers would help the economy, bring in foreign currency and improve India's image abroad.

According to government data, tourism contributed 5.2% to Gross Domestic Product in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2024 — less than half the weight it has in Thailand.

"Tourists are the brand ambassadors of a country. If you look at Thailand, it has treated tourism as a strategic sector and is investing heavily compared to other Asian countries," says Gosain, noting that the country receives more than three times the number of foreign tourists that India does.

"There needs to be a national economic strategy for tourism."

For now, that leaves India in the hands of more adventurous travelers like Volanth.

Over the years, she has taken road trips through the Himalayas, returned to Rishikesh — where The Beatles once meditated — for yoga training, and visited villages of local people she met along the way.

Mumbai and the green southern state of Kerala are among the places she still has on her list.

In the photos she has posted over the years from her mountain trips, her Instagram followers often comment that they didn't know India had such spectacular views.

“I will probably keep coming back for the rest of my life,” she says, “and still not get to see it all.”


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