Pilgrimage tourism marketing issues and challenges with reference to Tamil Nadu.

Abstract

Pilgrimage tourism is that form that is exclusively or strongly motivated for religious reasons. One of the oldest types of tourism and a worldwide phenomenon of religious history, it can be differentiated into various forms. The short-term religious tourism is distinguished by excursions to nearby pilgrimage centres or religious conferences. The long-term describes visits of several days or weeks to national and international pilgrimage sites or conferences. This paper investigates pilgrimage tourism and its issues and challenges and its cultural importance and socio economic development through pilgrimage tourism and also it analysis the basic infrastructure issues in pilgrimage sites. .Pilgrimage tourists were identified as a key factor in developing pilgrimage tourism. The data for this study were collected from local residents which engaged in pilgrimage tourism activities. Pilgrimage tourists were identified as a key factor in developing pilgrimage tourism in local communities. This research is mainly based on only secondary data. Secondary data required for this study was collected from different sources.